


Turns Out, Depression

by fudgesiclefantasy



Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: And also really gay, Background Biadore, Background Sashea, F/F, Nearly everyone is in this, Recreational Drug Use, School is mentioned for a hot minute for setting, There's a bit near the end about suicide ideation, There's some references to Pearlet and Famelet too, They all deserve better, Trixie's a mess, most of them smoke weed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 22:35:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14223261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fudgesiclefantasy/pseuds/fudgesiclefantasy
Summary: In Trixie Mattel's mind, there are only three concrete facts:1.) Acid Betty is a bitch2.) Katya is extremely attractive, platonically of course3.) There is absolutely nothing wrong with her mental health, she just has allergies and a tendency to sleep too much





	Turns Out, Depression

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to this trash bag attempt at productivity!!!! 
> 
> This is my first proper dive into drag race fanfiction and I hope it doesn't read as bad as I think it does, but I made a promise to post it today and I'm sticking to it.
> 
> Have fun, I guess??

Depression is a term so widely thrown around, that Trixie scoffs when she reads it on the screen of her laptop. The screen is too bright but she won’t lower the setting, she thinks it’s a metaphor for something. Moving the cursor to the back button, she clicks and holds it until the screen brings up her latest searches.

_Depression symptoms_

_Do I have depression?_

_Why am I sleeping so much?_

_How to stop a panic attack?_

_Why do I feel empty?_

_Why do I get angry for no reason?_

It wasn’t as if she was sad and upset all the time, so she quite clearly was just going through a bad patch and everything would go back to normal, obviously. Trixie’s buzzing phone drew her out of her mind with its reminder that she had to leave for school in thirty minutes, after closing the lid of her laptop and hauling herself to her feet, she left her bedroom and greeted her mother good morning before collapsing at the table for her usual half-hearted attempt at breakfast and ignoring her mother’s worried staring.

Everything was going to be fine.

 

* * *

 

 

It was so easy to get lost in the world of high school; it was the be all and end all of a teenager’s life, everything that was seen to be important happened in high school. The student body and its rumour mill could be your greatest ally or your worst enemy depending on if you were being told the rumours, or if the rumour was about you. Violet was a name on everybody’s lips so often that she took it all in stride, made it work to her advantage, and now she was supposedly the queen bitch. Everybody that met her thought that she made Regina George look like the girl-next-door, but to Trixie and the rest of the ‘Ru Girls’ as they were named by their principal, she really wasn’t that bad.

Katya was also someone who was often talked about, sometimes for good reasons, and sometimes for bad reasons. She turned up out of nowhere a year ago with no family, no explanation, and straight into the open arms of Sasha Velour. It was common knowledge that they were both Russian but neither spoke with the accent and Sasha refused to budge when the bitchy girls tried to dig up the first bad thing they could whisper about her. Rumours flew about her parents dying, being shipped off to boarding school, running away and joining the circus, there was even a stint about her father being involved in the Russian Mafia. However none of this removed the gleaming smile she wore on her face every day, her quirky style and a strange sense of humour made her likeable to the majority of the students at the school. After being sat next to each other for a semester in art, Trixie and Katya quickly became inseparable after a well-timed joke about Roxxxy and a bus stop and now a year later they could still be heard from two hallways away when one of them said something particularly funny.

Trixie also is talked about sometimes; you can’t exactly be _Trixie Mattel_ and not have people talk about you. She has it easier now since she began flying under the radar, but she always says that she just doesn’t have time for the petty bullshit anymore. It isn’t anyone’s business that when people talked about the sudden disappearance of her step-dad, Trixie hid in the bathroom for an hour and desperately tried to get her breathing under control, it also isn’t anyone’s business that she sometimes still calls Katya in the middle of the night because she has allergies and needs to be reminded that she can breathe and _she isn’t going to die._

 

* * *

 

 

Katya was taking a day off from school to work on some art pieces instead of being sat in the stuffy music classroom which she had no interest in, she had been up since the break of dawn and was now in the middle of a nap surrounded by canvases and paint, when the insistent chiming of her phone brought her into consciousness and she groaned. She had placed it on the mattress which was on the other side of the room and walking a few feet had never been so tiring, but at least she had her something soft to collapse on to when she checked her notifications.

There were a number of messages waiting for her in the Whoremoans group chat, scanning her thumbprint and pressing on the notification, Katya was greeted by a number of her friends talking and a photo.

_Shea CouSLAY (13:24): Barbie’s out for the count bitches._

The picture attached was slightly blurry and taken from the front of the drama classroom, where Katya knew that Shea sat, Trixie had her head down on her desk and her mouth was slightly open from how she rested against the surface. To the untrained eye, she looked as if she couldn’t be bothered with that particular lesson, but Katya could see the bags under her eyes hidden by makeup and the exhaustion that seeped from her pores even through a photo.

_The 49 th State (13:25): Lazy whore_

_Kimchi (13:25): She’s probably tired herself out from glaring holes into the back of Betty’s head earlier_

_Shea CouSLAY (13:26): What happened earlier? I can’t ask Trix with the state she’s in it’s a miracle that Visage hasn’t shaved her head._

_Max (13:27): Betty was making her usual comments about Trixie’s makeup, I don’t think she was particularly tolerant to all the shit today, you could feel the tension in the class._

Katya sighed as she felt another stress headache coming on, Betty was a bitch and everyone knew it, and Trixie was taking everything on the chin instead of calling her out. She quickly typed in a couple of messages in reply before leaving the app.

_Russian Whore (13:27): I mean she’s in school looking like a Troll doll after a spin in a blender._

_Russian Whore (13:28): Betty, not Trixie_

_Russian Whore (13:28): Even though Trixie’s makeup routine is a_ _coloring book for the blind_

Katya ignores the replies that come through on her phone as she drafts a text message.

_Kat (13:29): You’re the royalty of back alley garbage, Tracy._

It wasn’t Betty that had caused Trixie to be so on edge and Katya knows that, she thought back to the night before when Trixie had phoned her and said that she just felt lonely, but Katya could hear the rawness in her voice for holding back her tears and forcing her words to not waver.

The door opens to her right and she looks up to see Sasha walking in with two cups of what Katya hopes to be coffee, the door closes behind her bald cousin and Katya shifts to a sitting position on the mattress to leave space next to her. Sasha hands her a mug, communist red with a hammer and sickle on the side, it was the same as Sasha’s and they were a set given to them as a joke gift by Shea for the first Christmas that she had been dating Sasha. Katya remembers the look on her face when they were presented with the present and later on Sasha had whispered to her that she knew she was in love with Shea. Katya isn’t the type to become attached to the women who come into her life in a non-platonic sense, and she definitely was not jealous of the obvious love between her friend and her cousin, definitely not.

Sasha folds her legs beneath her as she takes up space next to Katya; she looks at the art pieces scattered around the room, some of them belonging to Katya and some to Sasha. The room they are currently occupying is in the basement of the Velour house, with how seriously that the two took their passions for art, Papa Velour converted the basement into an art room for the both of them to use.

“Is she okay?” Sasha’s voice brings Katya back down to earth, the quiet Russian music and burning incense at the other side of the room quelling her inner turmoil, the two women gaze at each other for a moment.

“I wish I could say yes,” Katya replies, “Val told me that she sleeps nearly all the time now and yet she still looks like she hasn’t slept in weeks.”

Sasha was not a woman of few words, but every word she spoke had thought behind it and a meaning that was meant to be known, it was something that the two had in common; Katya’s eccentric sense covered the burning intelligence that existed in her mind. “You were at least aware that something was wrong when it was me trying to help you, I can’t say the same for Trixie as nobody knows her like you do.”

Katya shook her head. “I have no idea what she’s thinking, and that’s the worst part, normally I know what’s going through her mind before she does but at the minute it’s like I’m dealing with two different people. Sometimes she’s my Trixie and then other times… she’s closed off and cold and I don’t understand how everyone isn’t fucking noticing?”

Sasha placed her mug in her right hand and then moved her left arm over Katya’s shoulder to give her a comforting squeeze. “It’s because she maintains that façade when she’s surrounded by everyone else, Trixie is a people person and she feels as if surrounding herself with her friends and focusing on their problems will put off her own. At the minute she’s breaking her back trying to help Adore ground themselves enough to actually talk to Bianca, she’s also helping Fame and Violet with some of their fashion work and she’s also trying to convince Pearl to give up spending most of her time high on whatever she’s taking this week. That along with the sense of humour gives off the impression that everything is fine, mainly because the idea is that people with any kind of issues are constantly down all the time when actually there are good days and bad days. I also think that she’s using you as a crutch-“

“What?” Katya’s head shoots up and she stares at her cousin.

Sasha squeezes her shoulder again. “I’m saying that you help her to forget what’s going on in her mind, and also she’s constantly trying to make you succeed and push you as far as she can because she doesn’t want the space to make her mind think about itself.”

Katya opens her mouth to argue, but the more she considers what she just heard, she agrees. Trixie is always focused on making people laugh and making sure that she is helping people with their problems, there are always times that she crashes like in music class today but this is how she copes, Katya realises. “I hate that you’re right, when did you get so smart?”

Sasha’s lips pull up into a gentle smile. “Someone had to teach you what you know.”

 

* * *

 

 

_Bonnie Del Rico (10:58): Has anyone seen Mattel today?_

_Jinkx (11:00): She wasn’t in English?_

_Shangela (11:01): She’s meant to be in Gym with me, she’s not here either, why you after her B?_

_Bonnie Del Rico (11:01): Just come back from seeing Ru, she asked me if I knew why Trixie is dodging her meetings with the GC._

_Courtney (11:03): There’s probably a reason she’s missing them, I don’t think we have anything to worry about, Trixie’s always okay._

 

* * *

 

 

“Trix? Baby are you okay in there?”

“I’m fine Mom, just caught the flu or something.”

Trixie was staring at the ceiling and praying that her Mom would accept her words and leave her alone, the door clicks open and she rolls her eyes because _of course not._ The bed dips slightly and Trixie turns to see the furrowed eyebrows and pursed lips that her mother only seemed to use with her just lately. Val raises a manicured hand and gently runs her fingers through Trixie’s hair, she stiffens slightly at the touch but soon relaxes into the familiar feeling, and she bites her lip to fight against the expanding pit in her stomach.

“Talk to me baby, what’s wrong?” Val whispers.

Trixie refuses to meet her mother’s eyes, her gaze doesn’t move from a crack in the ceiling that’s been there since before she can remember. “There’s nothing wrong, Mom, I’m okay I promise.”

Val sighs. “I can’t make you tell me if anything’s wrong, but Katya called me earlier, she’s worried about you.”

At the mention of Katya’s name, Trixie shifts slightly to try and grab her phone; however, Valerie is quicker and pushes it out of her reach. She makes an unimpressed noise and flops back to her original position looking at the ceiling.

“You’re not escaping this conversation Beatrix,” her mother continues despite Trixie’s protest at the use of her full name, “why did you want your phone anyway?”

“I need to make sure Katya’s okay, she always closes off around this time of year because of her parents, and you know that,” Trixie replies, forcing her annoyance to not show in her voice.

“Have you noticed that you seem to be breaking yourself to fix other people but you’re not taking a single second to take care of yourself? This is the most present I’ve seen you in weeks, and it’s because I’m not letting you distract yourself.”

The fire in Trixie’s chest begins to burn brighter. “Mom, my friends need me, I’m not going to focus on my own non-existent problems just because you tell me to!”

The pressure on the side of the bed is removed when Valerie gets to her feet and begins to pace the length of the room, “Trixie you can’t keep doing this to yourself.”

“Just get out, I’m tired.”

“Trixie-“She tried again.

“Out.” Trixie interrupted, closing her eyes.

The sound of fading footsteps and the click of the door when it closed were the only sounds to be heard, the worst part is that Trixie knows her anger was irrational. Turning on to her side, she stretches to reach her phone with shaking fingers which was precariously balanced on the edge of her bedside table, huffing at the energy she had to exert. After clicking the power button, Trixie scrolls through the numerous notifications she had received throughout the day.

There were six new Instagram followers, ten new likes on her latest post, a few twitter notifications, group chat messages, and _a lot_ of new text messages.

_Bianca (09:34): Ru’s on the hunt for you, where are you?_

_Jinkx (10:00): English is wrapping up and you’re still not here, everything okay?_

_Shangela (11:16): Bitch how dare you leave me alone in Gym with Alyssa, she’s making us run cheerleading drills as if anyone here is on the team. You best be sick or dying bitch._

_Violet (12:49): If you give me whatever germs you have when you come back I’ll kill you, but if you’re bunking off to go get laid, then come through you dirty whore_

_Pearl (12:55): Violet won’t stop talking about you bunking off school to shack up with someone, don’t be surprised if you get asked who you’re banging when you come back, but seriously are you still alive?_

There were more messages from Courtney, Kim, Alaska and even Roxxxy, but that was probably about the English homework they were most-likely given, Trixie thinks to herself, but two particular threads stick out to her.

_Adore (14:55): Guess who finally sacked up and talked to Bianca about all their mental shit? This bitch! We’re going out for food tonight and I have a good feeling about us, I owe you a joint or six for this Barbie, thank you. Are you cool though? Heard you weren’t in school today, I’m here if you need anything._

Trixie managed a small smile when she read the message, Adore deserved the world and they and Bianca were so cute together, she typed in a reply with slightly less shaking hands.

_Trixie (17:09): I’m so happy for you Adore, everything will go great tonight; let me know how it goes!_

She could feel a burning sense of irony somewhere, but didn’t have the mental capacity to consider what it was; Trixie then exited the thread and clicked on the most recent message.

_Kat (12:15): Why aren’t you here?_

_Kat (12:20): Tracy Martel? Hello? Anyone there?_

_Missed call from Kat at 12:40._

_Kat (12:45): Have you been put back in your packaging?_

_Kat (13:00): Not getting concerned at all now, send me a text whenever you see this, let me know you’re not dead._

Trixie’s breathing quickens when she thinks about Katya being worried about her, she nearly lets out a sob when she reads the last message.

_Kat (14:38): Finally escaped school, if you’re still asleep I’m coming over and getting you out of that cesspit, don’t leave me for another night of consorting with my inner demons._

Trixie presses on the icon in the right-hand corner which brings up Katya’s contact details, the contact photo is a candid that she had taken one night when they were both stoned on Pearl’s weed. It was one of Trixie’s favourite photos because her best friend is so beautiful, and there’s no shame in admitting that at all. Trixie puts the phone up to her ear after she presses the call button and waits for an answer.

A relieved sigh is the first sound that comes through the phone when the call is answered. “…Trixie?”

Trixie’s breath turns ragged. “Katya?”

The voice begins rapidly firing worried questions. “Talk to me, what’s happened? Are you okay? Do I need to call anyone? Is your Mom okay?”

“I need you to come over, I need you here, something isn’t right.”

Trixie lifts her hand and bites down on her fist to stifle her cries, saying the words had opened a gaping wound inside her, and Katya’s obvious panic was making her feel simultaneously worse and better.

“Breathe Trixie, I’m on my way.” Katya breathes into the phone, and Trixie can guess that she’s running to her car.

 

* * *

 

 

The next time a knock sounds at the door, it’s a soft sound and Trixie knows its Katya, she mutters a quiet “Come in” and she can’t even bring herself to face her friend. She knows she looks awful right now, puffy eyes and a runny nose, wrapped up in her blanket like a child and stubbornly facing the wall away from her bedroom door.

She feels a hand on her shoulder and suddenly Katya is talking. “Well don’t you look gross right now?”

Trixie can’t help herself, she laughs. “Shut up, you trash bag.”

She can practically feel the grin on Katya’s face right now; her laughter quickly stops when her breathing stutters, showing just how hard she’d been crying a few minutes prior. The thought of being in trouble with Ru when she finally managed to go back to school for some reason just tipped her over the edge, it was all too much to handle and Trixie needed everything to just stop.

“I’m so tired Kat,” Trixie mumbled, knowing that she was listening, “I sleep all the time and I’m struggling to get out of bed in the morning. I’m getting so lazy and I hate it.”

The bed shakes with how forceful Katya shakes her head; the hand on her shoulder tightens its grip and Trixie turns on to her back to face the weirdly intense eyes of her best friend. “You’re not lazy Trixie, the fact that you’re even talking to me about this right now is progress!”

“Progress of what? There’s nothing wrong with me!” Trixie insists.

Katya chews on her lip for a second while she considers her response. “I can’t make you think there’s anything wrong-“

Trixie rolls her eyes and interrupts. “Now you sound just like my Mom.”

“Even so…” Katya steamrolls over her, moving her hand to grip Trixie’s. “Remember not long after we first became friends, I went through a bit of a bad patch because it was nearing the tenth anniversary of me coming to America?”

“Yeah, I remember,” Trixie affirms. “How are you with that by the way? I know it’s not easy this time of year.”

“I’m okay, but we can talk about that another time,” Katya replies whilst ignoring Trixie’s protests. “I wasn’t sleeping enough, I wasn’t eating enough, but on some level, I seemed okay? It was just patches of bad feelings?”

When Trixie nods, Katya continues. “You barged in on my internal denial and made me see that something being wrong doesn’t have to look like what it does in the movies, you helped me realise that I needed help and Tallulah you need to start taking care of yourself instead of us.”

It’s not Trixie’s fault that she starts crying, Katya just has a way with words that slither through the cracks in her armour. She blinks and the water in her eyes spills over and falls down her cheeks, she isn’t sobbing, but it still breaks Katya’s heart all the same. Trixie paws at her eyes with the palms of her hands like a child and breathes shakily. “I can’t not be okay.”

She hates herself for letting Katya see this, but she doesn’t know how to rein herself in. Trixie registers Katya moving, and for a second her heart seizes when she thinks of her leaving, but she soon lays on the bed and pulls Trixie down to lay on her shoulder. They both let out a small sigh when they’re in a comfortable position, Trixie ignores the fact that the smell of Katya’s perfume makes her feel safe.

“Why can’t you not be okay?”

Trixie stutters for a second. “I don’t have time to not be what I’m needed to be.”

“And what’s that?” Katya prompts.

“I need to be there for people, I need to take care of our friends, my Mom, I need to get my education and get out of here.” She replies.

Trixie feels fingers running through her hair and she has to bite her lip to stop the sigh from escaping her lips, it would sound weird.

“Have you thought about the fact that you’re putting pressure on yourself to be there for everyone? That you’re taking on the responsibility of making everyone else okay because you don’t know how to ask for help?”

Trixie’s head begins to pound as she takes in what Katya is saying; she buries her face in the crook of Katya’s neck as if it would keep away the truth in the words she’s hearing. Trixie feels claustrophobia taking a hold of her nervous system and she jolts away from Katya’s embrace, it’s too warm, too much. Throwing her legs over the side of the bed so she’s completely upright, Trixie shivers uncontrollably as her head falls into her hands, she registers Katya saying something but she can’t hear her, she curls in on herself and it feels like her limbs have hardened and she can’t control them anymore.

Trixie tries to cry out for help but her throat closes and her vision blurs, she’s having a heart attack, she’s going to die. Katya’s muffled words get closer but Trixie still can’t make out what she’s saying, the tingling feeling in the back of her neck moves down her spine and spreads throughout her body, when it reaches her feet she whines in discomfort. Her brain feels as if it’s expanding, her head hurts, she tries to open her eyes, and then she’s falling.

 

* * *

 

 

Trixie knows she’s been asleep for a while when she opens her eyes, her body is exhausted and her mind is crying out to shut down again, her mouth is dry and it feels like all of her joints crack when she stretches with a yawn. She jumps slightly when she feels fingers moving through her hair, and the hand instantly pulls back, Trixie turns on to her back and looks to see Katya’s worried expression.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” Trixie furrows her eyebrows. “How long did you let me sleep?”

Katya’s worry only seems to intensify, her lips always thin and her eyes look as if they change colour slightly, but not that Trixie’s looking. “Trix, you collapsed…”

She shakes her head. “No, I didn’t? I think I’d remember something like that, Kat. I probably just fell asleep while you weren’t looking.”

“Trixie I watched you have a panic attack, and you’re looking at the champion of untreated anxiety. Why didn’t you say they were getting this bad?” Katya’s hands are shaking as her voice gets louder as she talks, her eyes are frantic and Trixie feels _so_ guilty.

She sits up and takes Katya’s hands into her own, rubbing the skin on the side of her index fingers softly, Trixie begins to mutter quietly under her breath. “I’m sorry Kat, I didn’t mean to scare you, I’m not normally this bad.”

They both let out a shaky breath and Trixie finds herself leaning down and pressing their foreheads together, it’s such a tender moment between them and this is definitely not the right moment to notice how pretty Katya’s eyelashes are. “Why didn’t you call for help?”

Katya breathes out a laugh. “I was terrified for the first ten minutes but when I reached the end of my rope and went to yell for help, you started snoring.”

Trixie can’t help it, she laughs, she waits for her mother to yell up the stairs to find a saner sounding laugh, but it never comes. Trixie sobers up slightly at the thought that it’s been a while since she laughed like that in this house. Katya seems to feel the change in mood and grips her hands a little tighter to bring her back to the present. “I think you know what I want to say, Tallulah.”

Trixie nods, “There’s something I need to do first though.”

She then throws her legs over the side of the bed and pushes herself up, Katya has to steady her when her legs give out slightly, but thankfully she doesn’t say anything. Looking down at herself, Trixie sees that she’s still in the shorts and t-shirt she had put on yesterday and she gasps. Katya spins to look at her, looking for anything wrong, and Trixie waves her off. “I look disgusting!”

Katya rolls her eyes and picks up her jacket that she left discarded on the floor when she arrived. “Tanith, you look beautiful, you always do.”

Trixie can’t understand the warm feeling that manifests in her stomach at the sentence, it’s not like Katya hasn’t complimented her before?

Whatever she’s probably just hungry.

 

* * *

 

 

After Trixie quickly throws on some more appropriate clothes, she walks over to Katya and wraps her in a hug before she can talk herself out of it, she feels the smaller girl tense slightly before wrapping her arms around Trixie’s larger frame. The stand together for a few minutes before Katya feels Trixie sag against her slightly; she pulls back and flicks Trixie on the nose. “Come on, we’re going downstairs for food, you need something in your system or you might pass out again.”

Trixie nods reluctantly. “I kind of got into it with Mom before I called you, I don’t think she’ll want to speak to me right now.”

Katya furiously shakes her head. “She’s just worried about you, we all are.”

“By that you mean you, my Mom, Adore and Sasha?”

Katya tries to not look shocked, but she fails miserably. “Sasha?”

Trixie sighs and shakes her head with a small smile on her lips. “You really think I didn’t know you told her? Kat, I know you better than you know yourself at times, of course, I knew.”

Katya looks small as she stares at her shoes. “You’re not mad?”

Trixie leans on her and smiles. “I’d be mad if it was anyone else.”

If there was a blush on their faces, at least the other person couldn’t see it. Trixie continues speaking. “I really wish you’d left that boarding school in Southborough sooner, you’ve been here ten years and you’ve basically only just got here.”

Katya smiles and it’s such a different look from her normal grins that Trixie can’t help but stare for a moment. “I didn’t realise how much I hated it there until Papa Velour sent me a letter, he gave me the option to come here since he knew that my Mom had to get me out of Russia, and I didn’t have any family. I owe him and Sasha everything, but I wish they took me in sooner too.”

A crash downstairs snapped them out of their moment and a muffled curse or two brought a small smile to Trixie’s face. Katya looked down and shook her head, “Come on, I’m making you two talk, I don’t need this on my list of reasons for therapy when my better Dad finally signs me up.”

“Don’t even joke about that, bitch!” Trixie elbows her as she tries to stride towards the door, forgetting her weakened state and soon Katya is catching her again as her legs can’t hold her up. She leans on the smaller girl quite heavily, Katya apparently has a _lot_ of upper body strength, the muscles in her arms ripple as she tenses and Trixie can’t pull her eyes away.

“See something you like?” Trixie can feel Katya smirking without even looking at her.

“No, I was just thinking that it’s been a while since I’ve been with a girl, I might call the last one I was with when all this blows over.” Trixie waves her off.

She sees Katya’s face fall and becomes confused, what was wrong with Raja?

 

* * *

 

 

Trixie knows she’s being an idiot when she notices that her steps down the staircase are intentionally quiet, Katya nudges her from behind and Trixie feels the woman behind her rolling her eyes.

“She’s not going to bite your head off, stop getting in your head.”

The bottom of the stairs arrives too quickly for comfort and Trixie can see her mother sat at the kitchen table playing with the hem of the long sleeves on her shirt, an anxious habit that has been passed down to Trixie too. Katya mumbles something about leaving her phone upstairs and disappears with a disarming smile before Trixie can latch herself to her, muttering quietly about stupidly attractive Russian best friends, she walks towards the kitchen and winces when she makes a sound and her mother’s head shoots up.

“Baby?” Her mother sounds like she’s been crying and Trixie’s heart breaks a little.

“Here, Mom.” She replies as she walks up to the table.

They continue to stare at each other for a moment before Valerie stands and pulls her daughter into a hug, even though Trixie is taller, she feels so small in her mother’s arms at that moment. The tension leaves her shoulders and she sinks into the embrace so willingly given to her.

“I’m so sorry, Mom…” Trixie whispers.

Valerie’s fingers run through Trixie’s hair, and while the gesture means a lot, it doesn’t offer the same comfort as when Katya had done it not long before. Valerie begins to whisper soothing words into Trixie’s ear to placate her, reminding her of how much she loves her, and how a silly argument will never change that.

“We do need to have a conversation about this at some point soon, Trixie,” Valerie pulls back and looks her dead in the eyes.

Trixie nods, she’s well aware of that now.

Valerie orders her to sit down at the table, Trixie obeys and watches as her mother turns to the counter and starts to make what looks like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Katya walks into the room and takes the seat next to Trixie as if she hasn’t been lingering outside to make sure everything went as smoothly as possible. Trixie can’t name the feeling that curls inside her stomach when she notices the distance between her and her best friend, but the inconvenience eases slightly when she shuffles close enough to feel the heat coming off her skin.

The silence that remains isn’t uncomfortable now that the elephant in the room has been dealt with, soon enough a sandwich is being placed in front of Trixie and quickly followed by another plate sliding across the table and landing in front of Katya. She looks confused for a second at Valerie before the unspoken question is answered for her.

“If you’re going to eavesdrop on our conversations, at least make sure that you’re not leaning against a hollow wall where I can hear you.”

Katya flushes red instantly and goes to speak, but an embarrassed smile breaks out when she sees that Valerie is grinning, and there’s no maliciousness to her words. Trixie’s heart swells at the sight, she reaches over and takes Katya’s hand into her own, she brushes her fingers lightly over the skin she can reach and when the flustered expression turns to her, Trixie feels like she’s flying.

She looks over to her mother, who’s looking at them with an expression that Trixie can’t place, and she begins to speak.

“I think I need to make an appointment to see my doctor.”

Valerie says that she thinks that might be a smart idea, and Katya squeezes Trixie’s hand in support. At that moment, for the first time in a long time, Trixie starts to think that she might eventually be okay.

 

* * *

 

 

When Trixie arrives at school the next day, with an appointment booked and a slight alleviation on the tension in her shoulders, she sees Katya and Adore waiting for her. They both stop their conversation when they see her walking up to the doors of their school, and the matching smiles they wear turn to her, Trixie makes a note to herself to find out what they were talking about later on. She bounces up the steps and into the waiting arms of Adore, they both laugh for a moment before feeling Katya wrapping her arms around the two of them and squeezing lightly.

“My Barbie bitch has returned!” Adore cries.

“I’ve only been gone a couple of days, I never knew you were so obsessed with me.” Trixie laughs.

The three seniors let go and Adore flips their hair over their shoulder before speaking again. “Girl please, the only girl more obsessed with you than me is this whore right here.”

Katya shrugs, never losing her smile. “Guilty.”

Trixie moves the strap of her bag to a more secure place on her shoulder and sighs as she pushes open the door to the school, while school causes a lot of her stress, she is so glad to be back with her favourite people.

“You know that the second it gets back to Ru that you’re in school, Matthews will fly through your homeroom door and rip you out of there to talk about your feelings.”

Trixie looks over at Adore as they speak, their attention is focused on the other end of the hallway, and she doesn’t even have to check to know that Bianca is stood by their locker. Trixie groans as she realises that she’ll have to have a talk with the guidance counselor after all, and there isn’t anything she can do to get out of it this time.

The one good thing about all of them being seniors is that their lockers are all at least close to each other; Trixie thinks as she reaches her own locker while Katya is a couple of rows down, rifling through lord knows what, Bianca sidles up to her and leans against the disgustingly green locker next to hers.

“I don’t know what’s going on, so don’t get mad at Adore, but I know them better than they know themselves so I know something is wrong.” She states. “I talked to Ru for you, she knows that you haven’t been bunking off, no matter what rumours Chachki has started about you.”

Trixie rolls her eyes. “What has the bitch said this time?”

“Just that you’ve been skiving school to meet up with Raja again.”

Trixie can’t even be irritated, she knows that Violet had probably just said something to Pearl and someone overheard, then they told someone else and now everyone will think it. She fully knows that what happened between her and Raja was a onetime thing at a party, and it won’t ever happen again. So Trixie can’t understand for the life of her why she told Katya that she might call her.

“I remember Pearl texted me something along those lines,” Trixie replies, “Thanks anyway though Bianca, you probably just saved me.”

Bianca grumbles at the sentiment. “Don’t make a big deal out of it; I don’t need Adore being a pain in my ass when they complain to me about you getting it up the ass from the old crone.”

Trixie watches as she walks back to Adore and places her hand on to their back, they both hang around for a minute longer before they say their goodbyes and head off to their homeroom class. Trixie thinks about how cute their relationship is, it must be so cool to date someone you’re so close with as friends, especially a couple where one is slightly erratic and enthusiastic, while the other is filled with sarcasm and biting jokes but they’ll still do anything for each other.

She is broken out of her thought process by Katya; leaning against her shoulder. “Tallulah, why must you deprive me of your attention?”

Trixie looks down at her with a smile. “I was looking at Adore and Bianca, they’re such a cute couple, makes me wish there were more girls around who aren’t already coupled.”

She was waiting for Katya to make some kind of weird comment about soulmates and the likelihood of someone’s soulmate being something like a fish, but she gets no reply. Trixie looks back and sees Katya staring off into the distance; she nudges her softly and furrows her eyebrows. “Off with the fairies again, Kat?”

Katya startles and gives a thin smile. “There’s more girls on the spectrum around here than you think, I’m sure Raja is just waiting for a call from you.”

Before Trixie can reply, Katya shakes her head and mumbles something about going off to homeroom early; she then speeds off down the hallway. Trixie is left stood next to her open locker, wondering what the hell that was all about.

Across the hallway, a locker door slams and Trixie turns to see Violet staring at her. She feels defensive all of a sudden; she arches her eyebrows and waits for Violet to speak first.

The other senior scoffs and the smirk settles back on to her face. “You better sort things out with your girl, she looks upset.”

If there was an award for the most dramatic exits, both Violet and Katya would be fighting for the title, Trixie thinks to herself as Violet walks away.

 

* * *

 

 

All the students in class turn to look up at the new addition when Trixie walks in, they soon return to whatever it is they were all talking about, and she moves towards the back of the classroom where Shea greets her with a hug. Katya is already sat in her seat and she has her earphones in, and something burns in Trixie’s mind to make her speak to the obviously annoyed woman in front of her. However Shea steals Trixie’s attention by gushing about the painting that Sasha had done of the two of them for their anniversary, it hits Trixie’s romantic side like a train and she finds herself fawning over how in love they are, it’s disgustingly cute.

Mr. Kressley, their homeroom teacher, calls the class to order and begins to run through registration. Before he even reaches halfway through the list, the door is shoved open and Mr. Matthews walks in, he mutters a few words to the other teacher and Trixie knows he’s here for her.

“Miss Mattel, if I can borrow you for a minute?” Mr. Matthews calls out, he doesn’t look particularly angry, but he’s never really had the face for anger.

Trixie sighs; she stands up and lifts the strap of her handbag on to her shoulder. “I don’t understand why people say that as if I have a choice …” She mumbles under her breath. “Only people like Sharon and Alaska get off on this Mysterious Punishment Realness.”

Katya doesn’t laugh like she normally would, and the absence of sound causes a hollow somewhere in Trixie’s stomach. Mr. Matthews looks at Trixie with raised eyebrows, in a seemingly passive-aggressive way of telling her to hurry up, so she keeps her head high and dawdles past him just to spite him.

 

* * *

 

 

Katya keeps her head down as Trixie leaves, the joke was funny, but she can’t bring herself to laugh. There had been a bitter taste in her mouth ever since Trixie had mentioned going to see Raja again, there’s nothing wrong with her, but she just isn’t the right person for Trixie. Katya is definitely allowed to not be a massive fan of her; she’s just trying to protect her best friend.

She thinks back to when her phone buzzed whilst she was waiting for Trixie to sort out the books in her locker.

_Pearl (08:40): Must be a cool superpower to instantly turn green whenever you think about Raja_

_Katya (08:41): Been smoking too much weed again Pearlie???_

_Pearl (08:41): Just because I’m buzzed it don’t mean I can’t see how jealous you get you look like me whenever Violet talks about Fame_

_Katya (08:42): I have no idea what you’re talking about_

_Pearl (08:42): She’s the only one that doesn’t know about your gross lesbian feelings_

_Katya (08:43): Fuck off I don’t have time for this_

She knows that she probably shouldn’t have spoken to Pearl like that, _but people should really learn to stop thinking I’m in love with Trixie, because I’m not._ She thinks to herself.

She’s definitely not in love with Trixie.

 

* * *

 

 

“Now, Miss Mattel,” The man begins, “We’ve spoken with your mother and we are aware of the issues you’re currently facing.”

Trixie rolls her eyes, she’s sat in a chair opposite Mr. Matthews in his office, and she’s already had it with this conversation, officially.

“So why am I in here?” She asks.

Mr. Matthews doesn’t look annoyed by her bluntness, “After you’ve seen your doctor, if some kind of therapy is required, we’d like you to also speak to our counselor at this school.”

“Ms. Davis? The chronic alcoholic?” Trixie raises her eyebrows.

Now Mr. Matthews does frown, and he’s about as intimidating as a puppy. “That was never proven.”

As annoyed as she’s acting, Ms. Davis is actually hilarious, and if this is what gets her out of the shit without the school having any actual involvement in whatever kind of mental health journey she’s about to go on, then she’ll take it.

“Fine, I’ll do it, so there’s no punishment?” Trixie asks.

“Apart from Miss Visage checking on you to ensure your progress, there’s no punishment.”

The woman in the chair raises an eyebrow, “So dealing with Visage is a punishment? I’ll tell her you said that” she laughs.

Mr. Matthews’ eyes widen for a split second before maintaining his cool façade, he knows Trixie won’t actually tell her, Lord knows what she’d do to him. “You can go back to homeroom, Miss Mattel, although I’m afraid you’ve missed nearly all of it.”

Trixie stands, picking up her bag and making her way to the door. “Yeah, I’m sure that’ll have such a negative impact on my life, Mr. Matthews.”

She doesn’t hang around long enough for him to reply, the door shuts behind her as she walks into the hallway. Her next lesson is English and she’s comforted with the knowledge that Jinkx will be there to make her laugh, she walks past her homeroom to see if anyone is lingering still, and she sees Adore stood by the classroom on their phone. Trixie hits them with her bag playfully when she walks up behind them, and they glare at her with no malice.

“Didn’t anyone ever tell you that it’s rude to distract a person when they’re texting their bae?” Adore grumbles.

“First of all, jump off a bridge for using that word,” She cringes, “Second of all, that was probably what my dad would have taught me if he bothered to stick around and give me the attention I’ve been deprived of.”

Adore balks for a second. “Your sick sense of humour still takes me by surprise and I hate you.”

Trixie kisses their cheek before moving back and spotting Katya talking to Sasha a few feet away from them, she goes to call out to them before she spots the serious expression on Katya’s face. Sasha has pursed lips and she’s holding an envelope out to her cousin, maybe it’s about a college?

She pulls herself back to focus on Adore rambling about not letting Bianca see her do that, without taking her eyes off the two Russians down the corridor, Trixie cuts her off mid-sentence. “What’s going on with those two?”

Adore looks to where Trixie is staring and shrugs. “Sasha was being really weird in homeroom, Bee tried to ask her if everything was okay but she barely replied to us, something must be up with them.”

Trixie watches Sasha leave after muttering a few more words to Katya, she strides away towards wherever Shea is most likely, Katya is still staring at the envelope and Trixie knows her back must already be aching from how hard she tenses the muscles when she’s stressed.

Shaking herself out of thinking about Katya’s extremely toned back, Trixie strides towards the other girl and leans in close, being careful to not scare her. “Kat, you okay?”

Katya jumps anyway, she looks up at Trixie with wild eyes for a second before focusing and sagging into Trixie’s taller frame. An arm comes up to wrap around Katya’s shoulder automatically, before pulling her in closer and letting her rest her head on Trixie’s shoulder.

“I’m fine, Trix, nothing to worry about.” She replies, convincing absolutely no one.

Apparently, Katya could feel Trixie’s eyebrows rising in disbelief. “Honestly, I’m fine, get to English. I’ll talk to you later.”

As if on cue, the warning bell sounded and Trixie knew she had to leave. “Fuck, okay but you’re talking to me if you need help.”

Pulling back so she could grab her bag from the floor, Katya straightens and her expression is back to one of slightly manic delight. “Oh Tobey, if I told you all the reasons I need help, we’ll be here until after graduation.”

Trixie purses her lips and scowls at Katya if anything; Katya’s grin just gets wider at the sight. She leans up on to her tiptoes, which is the cutest thing ever in Trixie’s expert opinion on all things Katya and kisses her cheek. It’s closer to the corner of her mouth than her cheekbone, but Trixie’s brain is too busy short-circuiting at the contact she was absolutely not ready for. Katya looks oddly pleased with herself; she then bids Trixie goodbye and walks off, saying she’s got a calculus lesson to be in.

Trixie is still too distracted to notice that the direction Katya walks in is opposite of her calculus class.

 

* * *

 

 

Katya skipped school.

That isn’t surprising, Trixie thinks, she does it all the time. The difference this time is that she didn’t tell anyone she left, and somehow she managed to get a pass out of school from Miss Visage, which _never_ happens.

Katya also isn’t answering Trixie’s texts or calls.

This is all fine.

After two days of no appearances and Sasha saying that Katya needed to be left alone, Trixie is about ready to pull her hair out by Thursday, Sasha comes up to her in the cafeteria. All it takes is a look and Trixie is soon following the other girl out of the cafeteria and outside, the Boston weather is pleasantly warm at this time of year, Sasha takes a seat on the nearest bench and pulls Trixie down beside her.

“First of all, she’s fine.” Sasha begins.

Trixie sighs, feeling a little pressure on her shoulders release slightly; she knows that Sasha wouldn’t lie to her. “Can you tell me what’s wrong with her?”

The bald woman shakes her head. “It’s not my place to say, she will talk to you, she’s just taking some time to process things. I can promise you that she is fine.”

The two talk for a little while longer before Sasha says that she needs to find Shea, and Trixie goes off to find wherever Adore had run off to.

After school, Trixie hears her phone chime in the kitchen, she looks up for a second before going back to focusing on her English homework. Whoever it is can wait until later.

“Trix, you’ve got a message from Katya! Want me to silence it?” Valerie calls, also from the kitchen.

Trixie is on her feet before her mother has even finished the sentence, she nearly runs into the kitchen and grabs her phone, she furiously taps the messaging icon on her screen after scanning her thumbprint.

_Kat (17:49): Tracy, can you meet me in the park?_

Trixie sighs, looks like she won’t be getting that English essay done tonight.

 

* * *

 

Trixie arrives at the park about forty minutes after she had texted Katya to say she was getting ready, the park is twenty minutes away from her house, but something about it called for a special consideration of what outfit she would wear. She turns up only looking vaguely different to how she would normally, in a pink fringe jacket with a matching skirt and a white shirt. It’s the thought that counts.

Walking through Boston’s budget version of Central Park, Trixie sees Katya lying under a tree, and she’s willing to bet that she has a lit joint in her mouth. Trixie makes her way over and notices a blanket already on the ground, but Katya herself isn’t laying on it, she clears her throat and raises her eyebrows at the display in front of her.

Katya looks over and grins lazily, she’s already stoned. “You’d kill me if I was the reason you got grass stains on whatever ill-considered practical fashion choice you made to come and see lil’ old me.”

The gesture is so touching, and yet Katya makes it seem like it was the most natural and logical decision, Trixie’s stomach clenches as she looks at the smile that’s currently trained on her and feels her own lips turning up as she smiles back.

The blanket soon finds itself with Trixie sprawled across it, her jacket is neatly folded nearby and her shirt sleeves have been rolled up to her elbow. She gets a little self-conscious when she catches Katya eyeing them, but she soon moves her gaze back to the sky and acts as if nothing happened.

The silence between them isn’t uncomfortable; both girls find peace when there aren’t constantly people shouting around them like at school. Trixie listens to Katya take a deep drag and inhale for as long as her lungs can expand before she exhales and moves her hand to offer the joint to the girl next to her. Trixie does enjoy smoking weed, being friends with Adore, Katya, and Pearl would make anyone desensitised to the stigma. However she prefers blunts as the tobacco makes her throat raw, and she isn’t the one.

She takes the joint from Katya anyway, and takes a small drag from it and realises that she could take the hit with no trouble. Katya watches it happen and clarifies. “I wasn’t sure if you’d get here before or after I’d finished smoking this, so I did half mixed with tobacco near the end, but it’s mainly weed from halfway down to the roach card.”

Trixie laughs, “Thank you for thinking of my poor throat,” before taking another, longer hit.

“You’d be such a bad straight girl, if you sucked dick you’d have the worst gag reflex.”

Trixie coughs as the laugh bubbles up in her throat. “Honey, the last time I was gagging on anything was in the bathroom of The Viper Room, and it’s called The Viper Room for a reason, honey!” She draws out the vowels for as long as possible before Katya shoves her and they both burst out laughing.  

“You rotted cunt!” Katya wheezes and slaps her leg a few times.

Her teeth shine in the reflection of the sunlight and she looks so beautiful. Trixie looks away from her and focuses on not coughing out the next hit she takes, and then passes it back to Katya. They pass the joint between them a few more times before Trixie taps out and leaves Katya to finish the rest, Trixie hums quietly as she lets herself feel the buzz that’s pushing itself through her body. It feels as if she’s two feet off the ground, and it feels incredible.

“Feeling okay?”

Trixie nods, a dopey smile on her face. “It hit me fast this time, what’s the strain?”

“Don’t you recognise it?” Katya asks, her pupils are blown wide and Trixie can’t stop looking at them.

She thinks for a moment, there’s an itch on the tip of her tongue as if the answer is sitting right there, desperate to break free from the prison of her mouth-

A hand waving in front of her face breaks her from her focus, and the train of thought is gone. Trixie frowns at the loss of information. “It tastes like berries but I can’t place it.”

Katya smiles softly. “It’s called Blue Dream, Adore and Pearl have got me loving this stuff, it’s supposed to be really good for anxiety. I’ve been smoking this on and off for days now.”

Trixie makes an affirmative sound before cocking her head to the side, the motion feels like gravity is a million times stronger and keeping her head up is absolutely exhausting. “Is this because of the letter?”

Katya’s expression becomes more focused for a second, and Trixie knows that she wouldn’t have noticed had she not been staring at her best friend ever since she started to get high. She doesn’t say anything so Trixie prompts her again with another question. “Was it about college?”

Katya closes her eyes for a second. “It was from my Mom actually; she told me she misses me.”

Trixie sits up and moves closer to her side. “This is a good thing, right?”

She nods. “Yeah it’s a good thing, I just coped with losing my family by assuming that they all hated me and I thought that I had made my peace with it.”

“But?” Trixie prompts.

“But reading the words that she had written made me realise how much I miss her and my brother,” Katya answers, “she said that she wanted to bring him over to America to see me, but my father knows I’m in Boston so it’d have to be New York or something.”

Trixie sighs as she thinks about what she’s about to say. “Are you sure you’re safe?”

“I have to hope so, I need to see them again, as long as he doesn’t find out it’ll be fine. She actually said in her letter that she doesn’t know how to accept that I’m a lesbian but she loves me and that’s enough to make her want to try. She said she’s sorry for not stopping my father from sending me away.”

It isn’t the dream life, but Trixie sees that this is a massive leap forward for Katya; she shuffles forward again and leans down to wrap her arms around the woman. “I’m so happy for you, Kat!”

Katya lets out a watery chuckle, and Trixie pretends that she doesn’t see her quickly wiping her eyes, they cling to each other for a moment longer before they pull back and stare at each other. Katya’s gaze leaves Trixie’s eyes and she wonders if there’s something on her face for a moment, the staring lasts for a few moments longer and Trixie’s tongue loosens.

“You’re so beautiful…”

The softness of her tone makes it perfectly clear that it was not a joke, and Katya blushes. She looks away for a second with a smile fighting to break through her tight-lipped façade, and Trixie can’t bring herself to regret saying it.

Now Trixie isn’t stupid. She knows that she is attracted to women; she’s known this for a very long time. Thankfully she has been blessed to have a mother that was fully supportive and accepting even before she came out; the part about her dad running out on her, and her step-father being a homophobic abusive bastard aside. As a woman who loves women, she can appreciate the way that Katya seems to be glowing right now, her smile seems just a bit brighter, her eyes pop more with the eyeliner she’s currently wearing, and her hair has that messy and wavy look to it that just makes Trixie want to run her fingers through it. She wonders how soft it is.

Violet, Pearl and Fame all have the model-like qualities that make them beautiful, Adore and Jinkx have their singing and their charm, Bianca and Kim are both hilarious, and Sasha and Shea are basically perfect with their fashion. All her friends are beautiful in more ways than just physically, but there’s something about Katya right now which just makes Trixie’s mind go blank.

Her best friend is beautiful, just because that fact seems to linger in Trixie’s mind quite often, it doesn’t mean she has feelings for her.

 

* * *

 

_Adore (15:00): You got this girl!!!!_

_Kat (15:00): We love you!!!! Tell us how it goes!!!! Don’t fuck him for a prescription!!!! Serious though mama, shit’s not worth it_

Trixie is willing to bet her Barbie collection on the idea that her best friends are in Adore’s room getting high again, and she wishes she was with them _so bad._ Currently, she’s in the car with her mother, on the way to the doctor’s surgery. She could have easily walked the distance, it was only a few streets away, but Valerie had been a little more attentive as of late, and offering to drive her wherever was one of the recent occurrences, even though Trixie can drive. Her car was in the shop though; it was all Adore’s fault after they had driven the car into a bollard whilst slightly inebriated. She, Adore and Katya had all agreed to say that a cat had run in front of the car and Adore had swerved to avoid it but lost control.

Trixie smiles softly to herself as she recalls the day it happened, at the time she was on the verge of a panic attack and Katya had had to talk her down, but looking back on it she knows that she wouldn’t change her friends for anything. Jolene starts to play on the radio quietly and Trixie appreciates her mother turning it up without even needing to be asked. She sings along and matches the grin that’s manifested on Valerie’s face.

“Are you ready for this?” She asks.

Trixie nods. “It’s only an introductory session, Mom. Nothing will happen probably, they’ll ask me some questions so they can guess how fucked up I am, and then I’ll leave.”

Valerie purses her lips at her daughter’s blasé attitude; she’s annoyed that she can’t be mad because they both share that trait. At least Trixie doesn’t appear to be nervous, that confidence she gets from her father, wherever the bastard is. When they reach the surgery, Valerie grabs on to Trixie’s hand before she can escape the car. “I’ll let you have as much freedom as you want with this, but please don’t shut me out?”

Trixie is silent for a moment, she then moves back into the car and pulls her Mom into a fierce embrace. “Don’t worry; I’ll keep you in the loop.”

Valerie sighs. “Good, lord knows what Katya would tell me if I had to ask her.”

Trixie laughs loudly. “Probably that I’ve got some deep dark issues that only shock therapy could fix.”

“Only if she could administer it and take it at the same time.”

Trixie screams, she often forgets how funny her Mom actually is. The internal anxiety she had been desperately trying to hide has been quelled, pushing open the door, she climbs out and turns back to close the door. “See you soon, Mom.”

 

* * *

 

Her doctor is a man named Mr. Ruiz, he’s a man that’s clearly aged well, and if Trixie wasn’t a raging homosexual then she might even think he’s attractive. “So Miss Mattel, why don’t you start with how things have been over the last few weeks and then we’ll go from there?”

Trixie shifts uncomfortably. “Sure, I guess.”

He nods for her to begin and she tells him the basics. “I don’t really know where to start, I’ve been having trouble sleeping normally-“

“Too much or too little?” The doctor interrupts.

“Too much.” She replies and she watches him scribble something on the notepad in front of him. “There’s the down periods too, like I’ll just be numb for weeks at a time, sometimes it gets a little better but generally everything still sucks.”

Dr. Ruiz hums thoughtfully, still taking notes. “Have you been struggling in your personal life? With relationships and schooling?”

“There are days when I can’t get out of bed to go to school, I can’t focus long enough to do any proper studying, I fight with my Mom a lot, and I distance myself from my friends. They’re worried about me, well the ones that know are. Most of my friends have no idea this is happening to me.”

“Do you think your anger is because of your lack of control over this situation? Do you find yourself exercising more control in other areas of your life?”

“If you mean by that, completely removing myself from situations that control me then yes,” Trixie replies, shifting slightly.

She’s hyper aware of every move she is making right now, the calculating look on the doctor’s face makes her worry about how she’s acting. Maybe she’s making a massive deal out of nothing, maybe there’s nothing actually wrong, maybe she just needs to get over herself, maybe people like Adore and Katya would be better off without her trivial bullshit, and they have enough to deal with on their own without looking after their basket case friend.

Doctor Ruiz is still looking at her. “Where did you go just then?” She shakes her head rapidly, and he smiles as if he knows exactly what is going through her mind. “Enough with the pleasantries, Trixie in order for me to help you, I need you to tell me the truth.”

Trixie runs her fingers through her hair on instinct, so much for keeping it immaculate. “I get lost in my head quite a lot, I think something insignificant and then I just fall down a hill and I can’t get my brain to just shut off.”

The doctor nods and writes some more notes on his paper. “I’m not a licensed therapist so I won’t be providing you with any help beyond a referral, but the last thing I need to ask, are these issues you’re dealing with stemming from any kind of trauma?”

Trixie’s eyes drop to the floor, she begins picking at the skin on her wrist before catching herself and meeting the man’s eyes, of course, he noticed that slip-up. “There’s a rocky childhood, but it’s no big deal, I’m over it.”

The doctor hums thoughtfully. “Well I can’t give you any form of diagnosis at this stage, but what I’m going to do is refer you to a therapist and they will give you a formal assessment of your all around mental health and then they will plan with you what the next step will be. The questions I asked you today are fully confidential and they will be sent to your therapist and that’s it, although with your consent I would like to provide them with your phone number we have on file so they can set up your first appointment. Will that be okay?”

Trixie blinks, that was a lot of information to process. She feels exhausted after talking about the surface of what’s been bothering her, and she’s now beginning to realise that this is not going to be as simple as she thought.

 

* * *

 

Trixie leaves the surgery feeling both lighter and heavier and armed with the knowledge that her potential therapist is going to call her in the next couple of days. When she reaches the parking lot, Valerie is sat on the bonnet of the car, and she spots Trixie instantly as if she’d been watching the door for her return. She jumps off the roof and cries out in surprise when her daughter runs into her arms.

Valerie pulls Trixie close and squeezes her comfortingly, Trixie isn’t crying but Valerie’s heart is breaking nonetheless. “Trixie, what happened? Are you okay?”

The younger woman breathes in deeply for a few moments before she even tries to reply. “He asked me about what’s been causing all the issues, and I talked about my father and some other stuff and I’m so drained already.”

“I know this entire situation is incredibly shitty, but with each day that you make the effort, you’re a step closer to getting well again” Valerie mumbles softly.

Trixie pulls back and tries to smooth her hair down. “Damn Mom, did you rip that out of a self-help book?”

“Get your ass in the car, Beatrice.” Valerie deadpans.

Trixie glares at her Mom. “Using my full name is a low blow.”

She grins. “I know, and it always works! Now come on, let’s go home, there’s a bottle of wine with my name on it.”

 

* * *

 

When they turn on to Pilgrim Street, Trixie sees their front door open, Valerie tuts from her driver’s position and sighs. “I can’t trust those idiots to do anything…”

She then shakes her head at Trixie’s questioning look, they turn on to their drive and Valerie kills the engine. Trixie throws her seatbelt off and then jumps out of the car, she waits for her mother to exit the car and lock it behind her before she moves to the door. Trixie pushes her way inside albeit cautiously, moving towards the kitchen she smiles amusedly as she realises what’s going on.

Adore and Katya are stood next to the fridge and they’re arguing over takeaway restaurants, Adore is insisting on pizza, and Katya wants Thai food, neither of them notices Trixie and Valerie stood in the doorway. Trixie loves the both of them so much.  

“I thought you told me you’d have all this sorted by the time we got back?” Valerie groans.

The two people in front of them jump and their heads swing to look their way. The two teenagers both look as if they’d been caught with their hands in the cookie jar, and Trixie can’t fight back her laughter. They both rush forward to grab her in a hug and they squeeze each other tightly.

Valerie is chastising them for fucking up the plan when Katya speaks. “We need to let go soon because this feels like I’m being born again.”

“The question is… Whose pussy are we coming out of?” Adore mumbles with their face still pushed into Trixie’s shoulder.

“Definitely not mine!” Valerie calls from the living room.

“Damn, I thought I was finally going to be able to tell the whole school I finally touched Trixie’s mom’s pussy.” Adore cackles.

Trixie groans, call them disgusting and elbows them in the side with a bit more force than necessary; they cry out in pain and glare at her. She gives them a fake smile before pulling a confused face when she hears her Mom gasp from the other room. Katya looks excited about something, so Trixie waits for the severed head or plastic hands to be thrown at her.

“Come see this, Trixie!” Valerie yells.

Inside the living room, there are blankets covering both sofas, fairly lights covering every conceivable surface, most of them aren’t even hung up, they’re just plugged in and spread across the floor. Between the two sofas, there are two giant buckets which are filled with sweets and there’s also takeaway menus strewn across the coffee table that’s in the centre of the room.

“You guys did this?” Trixie mumbles as she walks through the room.

“We couldn’t guess how you were going to be after starting this mental health shit, so in case it went bad, we prepared for the worst.” Adore explains as they jump over the back of the sofa and on to the cushions. They were black with bloodshot blue eyes sewn into them, and Trixie already hates them.

As if Katya knows what she’s thinking, she picks one up and fluffs it before throwing it at the other girl. “I wanted to leave my mark on your home before adulthood comes and fucks us up the ass.”

Valerie raises an eyebrow from where she’s stood reading an Indian food menu. “I think you’ve done that in more ways than just gifting us with weirdly accurate eye pillows, which are amazing though, thank you.”

Katya bounds over to the woman and gives her a hug. “See, someone understands my art.”

“I can’t say I understand the fairy lights though.” Valerie continues.

“They’re definitely a fire hazard,” Trixie says as she steps over another group of them to get to the sofa where Adore is sat on their phone, presumably texting Bianca.

“She was rambling on about it being some deep metaphor with the light chasing off the darkness or some bullshit,” Adore explains, “We get it Zamo, you’re deep and philosophical.”

The two on the sofa cry out in surprise when Katya jumps on them, her head ends up in Trixie’s lap while her legs are purposefully taking up all of Adore’s space. Trixie’s fingers find themselves running through Katya’s hair, but she looks up when she hears a camera shutter click. Valerie is holding her phone up at the three of them and looking incredibly proud of herself. “You guys look so cute!”

Adore throws Katya’s legs off of their body and shoots up to look at the photo. Trixie clutches on to Katya tighter to stop her from completely falling off the sofa, but it doesn’t help that Katya is laughing her ass off and shaking so much she’s nearly falling of her own volition.

Trixie knows that her Mom has sent them the photo when their phones all buzz collectively; she shoves a hand between the sofa and her ass so she can grab the device from her pocket and pulls it out. She opens the messenger app and clicks on the photo, while she’s waiting for it to load she notices Adore’s smug grin being directed her way. When it loads Trixie looks at the three of them all looking so happy, Adore and Katya both have wide grins on their faces, Adore is trying to shove Katya’s legs off of them, and Katya’s back is arched to keep herself on the sofa.

Trixie’s gaze then moves to herself in the photo, and she’s just staring at Katya, it would look creepier if it wasn’t for the fond smile on her expression. It can’t be denied that the look on her face can only be described as… intimate? Adore is still grinning at her when she looks away from the photo and Trixie wants to punch them.

Whatever she’s still posting it on Instagram.

_@malibubarbie: Found the homeless youth in my house, giving back to the community by providing them shelter and better outfits._

“Bitch!” Adore yells when they check their notifications.

Trixie blows them a kiss. “You know you’re the only person for me.”

Katya gasps. “Are you cheating on me with Boston’s answer to Amy Lee?”

“I hope you get crabs.” Adore deadpans, but then yells in shock when Valerie claps them around the back of the head, Trixie notes that it’s always funny when it’s not her.

“Adore is my person, but you’re my lesbian life partner, I thought we discussed this.” Trixie looks down at Katya, who is still lying on her lap.

“Bitch it said nowhere on the form that I would have to share.” Katya banters.

“Oh shit!” Trixie gasps. “I must have given you the wrong form to fill out, sorry baby.”

She knows she’s won the little game when Katya goes silent for a second, her cheeks flushing red for some reason. She’s so cute when she blushes, Trixie thinks. Adore distracts them by asking them what food they want to order tonight.

“So this is why you two were arguing when we walked in?” Trixie asks.

Adore nods and cuts Katya off before she can reply. “We were talking about which you food would cheer you up the most, right? So me being the obvious best friend, said you would want pizza, because duh. Then this dumb bitch started arguing with me and saying you’d want Thai food.”

Katya looks up imploringly. “Come on Trix, which one of us got it right?”

Trixie grimaces. “I’m actually in the mood for Chinese tonight, is that okay?”

Her Mom laughs as Adore and Katya both curse and glare at each other.

 

* * *

 

Later on in the night, when Katya returns from calling Sasha to tell her she won’t be home tonight, Trixie and Adore are sprawled on the sofa with Brooklyn Nine-Nine playing on the TV. Neither of them is really paying attention, since they’re talking quietly. She thinks about going and sitting on the other sofa, but then she’d be lonely, so she walks to the occupied sofa and gestures for the two of them to move. Trixie pulls herself upright and Adore does the same, Trixie remains on the end, Adore stays in the middle, and Katya takes the other end. The three of them end up as one mass of tangled limbs with Katya and Trixie’s legs twisted together on top of Adore, but they don’t seem too mad about it.

“So what are we talking about?” Katya asks, shifting to get comfortable.

“Nothing much, Trix was just asking about me and Bianca.” Adore says.

Trixie looks down at her phone to see some Instagram notifications, the other two also check their phones when they buzz, and apparently there have been some comments on the photo. Trixie opens the app and doesn’t take notice of Katya’s thin lips.

_@rajathegemini: Looking good, Mattel_

“Yes!” Adore screams. “She wants that ass, Mattel!”

“Shut up you whore, it’s probably just friendly.” Trixie doesn’t look up as she likes the comment but doesn’t respond, for some reason something is stopping her.

Another notification comes through, and Katya chokes on the Pepsi she’s currently drinking from.

_@pearlliason: Looking significantly green, Zamo_

“The fuck is she talking about?” Trixie asks, looking to Katya for an explanation.

She shrugs. “She’s probably high, I’ve no idea.”

They soon forget about the comments when Katya mentions finally ordering Chinese; Valerie gives them her order before saying that she’ll be upstairs if they need her. Since Katya insisted on paying for it, she goes into the kitchen and rings it through, while Trixie and Adore stay on the sofa.

Trixie nudges Adore to get their attention. “How did you realise that you liked Bianca?”

Adore blows out a lungful of air as they consider their answer to the question, by the time that they reply Katya has made her way back into the room and reclaimed her spot. Trixie doesn’t want the answer to the question anymore.

“I can’t answer for everyone, but it took me years to realise, I’ve known Bianca for years but it wasn’t until recently that I realised that I actually really like that bitch.” They begin, and Katya quickly twigs as to what they’re talking about. “You look at someone and just see them differently to everyone else; like you love your friends and everything, but when you like someone it’s a completely different feeling.”

Katya continues when they stop talking. “It’s wanting someone to be happy no matter what. If the person you like was dating someone else or bathing in the attention of someone else, the jealousy would eat at you obviously but you would want them to be happy above all else.”

“At least in my case,” Adore begins, “One day I just looked at my best friend and thought that she looked more beautiful than the day before, and then I had the same thought again the next day, and the day after that. Every day I think she’s more beautiful and I’ll never get tired of thinking about her, it’s gross but it’s true.”

“You’re so adorable I want to snap both of our necks right now.” Katya grins.

Trixie remains silent, she doesn’t want to think about all the recent internal monologues she’s been having about someone she doesn’t want to consider. Just because that situation applies to Adore, it doesn’t mean that it’s a universal rule about falling in love. Adore playfully punches Katya and Trixie watches them play fight for a few moments, when the doorbell rings, Katya jumps up and runs to the door, before cursing loudly and running back into the living room to grab her forgotten wallet and then running out of the room again.

As soon as she’s gone, Adore turns to Trixie and puts their hand on her leg. “Stop freaking out, she doesn’t know anything.”

Trixie scoffs. “What the fuck are you on about?”

They purse their lips. “Don’t fuck with me, girl. I just watched the truth slap you in the face harder than when Ru called out Pearl about her failing high school last year. It’s okay that you have feelings for her, Trixie.”

The other girl feels a burning behind her eyes, and she refuses to cry right now, it doesn’t help that Adore never uses her proper name unless it’s serious. “I don’t have feelings for her.”

They smile pitifully. “You’re literally the only two that don’t know.”

When Katya returns with bags full of food, she frowns when she sees Trixie refusing to look at her, and Adore looks up with an expression that Katya can only describe as fucked up.

 

* * *

 

Adore leaves at about 10 PM so they can see Bianca for a little while before heading home, Katya left Trixie asleep on the sofa and cleaned up all of the rubbish from their food. When she is putting the containers in a plastic bag, her phone buzzes in her pocket.

_Adore Delano (22:12): At Bianca’s, I’m safe._

_Adore Delano (22:12): You bitches best have been worrying about my safe journey_

_Adore Delano (22:13): Also Katya, girl you need to talk to Trixie. It’s all fine if you wanna pretend you don’t have more than platonic gay feelings for her, but that ain’t gonna wash with me. Trixie helped me get my shit together with Bianca. I wanna do the same for you guys_

Katya sighs, lying to Pearl is easy. Lying to Adore is nearly impossible, even through text. Her feelings for Trixie have always been weird and complex, she sees love and sex as two completely different things, but when it comes to Trixie she always thinks about the game rather than the winning goal. Sports metaphors aside, she’s been attracted to Trixie since she first arrived at their high school.

All the boys at school seemed to obsess over Pearl, Violet and Fame because they have model like bodies and flat stomachs. By that demographic, Katya fits in with that too. Especially with her sexuality since straight men seem hell bent on showing her what ‘good dick’ is, as if there’s any such thing to a fucking lesbian, morons.

Katya hates objectification, there’s so much more to a woman than just her body, but it would take her being blind to not appreciate Trixie’s form. The slopes and curves of her body are enough to make anyone drool, and she finds herself getting a little warm at the thought.

_Katya Zamo (22:16): I don’t know if I’ll be able to, but I’ll try_

 

* * *

 

 

Trixie wakes up to a cold room and no friends around her, she checks her phone to see that it’s 11:30 PM and Adore had left to go be with their girlfriend. Sitting up, she sees the patio doors open slightly, and she knows that Katya is outside smoking. She grabs Katya’s jumper from the back of the sofa, a grey Boston High School jumper which was softer than the one Trixie owned and it had ‘ZAMO’ printed on the back in large white letters. She can’t explain the comfort she feels when it encases her skin.

She doesn’t understand how people wear jeans all the time; she’s uncomfortable in the one pair she owns that she’s currently wearing at the moment. Trixie sleepily walks over to the doors and pushes her way outside, to see Katya’s pale form swallowed by the moonlight, and she hates herself for thinking such fairy tale bullshit.

Shutting the door behind her, Trixie walks over to Katya and hugs her from behind, she’s always more cuddly when she’s tired. Katya turns so she can hug Trixie properly; secretly she prefers it when her best friend isn’t in heels because it minimizes the height difference that already exists between them.

“So are you going to tell me how you actually felt about today?” Katya asks, her voice a little deeper because of the smoking, and Trixie can’t say that she doesn’t like it.

“I told you guys the truth earlier, it’s exhausting shit, but I left the surgery feeling a little lighter. Maybe an actual therapist can help me.” She whispers, snuggling closer to her friend.

Katya takes another drag of her cigarette before speaking again, she makes sure to blow the smoke towards the wind current so it would carry away from Trixie. “I’m so proud of you, Trixie.”

The taller girl hides her smile in Katya’s hair. “Thank you for trying to get it through my head that I need help, it would have taken me way longer without your help.”

Katya shrugs. “It’s no big deal.”

Trixie stares at her with raised eyebrows. “You don’t see how much you mean to me, do you?” When Katya doesn’t reply, she continues. “I don’t know what I’d do without you, Kat. You mean everything to me!”

“It’s not that I think I don’t mean anything to you,” Katya explains, “I just don’t see why.”

Trixie balks for a second and then rushes to respond. “Why does anyone love anyone?”

Katya freezes. “You love me?”

Trixie nods. “More than anything…” The truth in the statement takes her off guard, and she realises what she just said. Katya’s gaze moves from Trixie’s eyes again, and she thinks she knows where it’s gone. She bites her lip without thinking and Katya moves closer.

Trixie pulls away abruptly, what the fuck is she doing? Katya puts out her cigarette in the ashtray that Valerie had bought for her, and she sighs before looking at Trixie with tired eyes. “Come on, let’s go to bed, I’m exhausted.”

Trixie nods and pulls her inside, she sends Katya up to her room while she makes sure that everything is secure. She checks all the plugs and kitchen appliances before making sure all the doors are locked, when she’s certain that Katya is in her bedroom, Trixie goes into the downstairs bathroom and takes off all her makeup. With a reddened face, now devoid of products, Trixie stares at her reflection.

“I nearly kissed Katya.” She states, watching for a reaction in her features.

“I might have feelings for my best friend.”

“I want her to kiss me.”

The little smile that springs up on her reflection is extremely telling, Trixie then whips her phone out and finds her message thread with Adore.

_Trixie (00:03): She nearly kissed me_

_Trixie (00:03): Fucking hell Adore_

_Trixie (00:04): I have feelings for her_

 

* * *

 

When Adore’s phone chimes four times, Bianca threatens to throw it out of the window from where she’s lying pressed against their back. Adore shushes her and ignores her scathing reply while they wait for their phone to load the message. They have three messages from Trixie, which makes them squeal and pat Bianca excitedly. They aren’t even dissuaded when Bianca rolls over and ignores them; whatever they’ll explain this very important development in the morning.

_Adore (00:06): Finally! This is a good thing, I promise. Make sure you actually think about what this means don’t do anything rash just because she looks hot tonight. I’ll call you tomorrow; Bianca’s getting bitchy because I’m not cuddling right now_

_Adore (00:07): Please do not tell her I told you that, she’ll kill me_

Exiting the thread, Adore checks the other message, which is from Katya, of course.

_Katya Zamo (00:00): Why am I such a gross lesbian?_

Adore laughs whilst typing out their reply.

_Adore Delano (00:08): She makes you a mess, man. It’s cool though; just talk to her at some point soon, maybe not immediately. It’ll work out, I swear._

They silence their phone and plug the charger back in, setting it on the bedside table and turning on to their side so they can pull their girlfriend close. Adore thinks for a moment about how similar Katya and Trixie are to them and Bianca, they grin as they settle down to sleep, thinking about how they’ll make such a cute couple.

 

* * *

 

Katya is looking at Trixie’s wall of memories when she enters the room; the wall is filled with photos and all kinds of tickets to remind Trixie of her last couple of years of high school. She shakes her head at herself when she looks at how many photos there are of Katya up on that wall, and most of the movie tickets were also given to her when her best friend was there.

“Didn’t know you’d done this?” Katya talks, not taking her attention off the wall.

“Yeah,” Trixie answers, pulling off her jeans, “I was going to show everyone after I’d finished it.”

When Katya turns around, her eyes linger on Trixie’s exposed skin for a second longer than what’s appropriate, but with how Trixie blushes she can’t bring herself to look away. “You mean this isn’t done?”

She shakes her head. “No, I still have some more photos to put up, there’s a lot of us, you know.”

Katya laughs. “That’s because my best friend is such an Instagram whore.”

Trixie rolls her eyes as she climbs into bed. “I’d disagree with you, but it’s true.”

Katya rolls her eyes affectionately as she digs an oversized shirt out of her bag, choosing not to call Trixie out on stealing her hoodie. “You mind if I just sleep in this and my boxers?”

Trixie waves her hand as if to say she doesn’t give a shit. “Just get your skinny ass over here and cuddle, I’m tired.”

“Whatever the princess wants.” Katya deadpans as she flops on to the bed behind Trixie, she shuffles forward until she can wrap herself in the comforter and then wraps her arm around Trixie’s stomach.

“Damn right.” The other girl sighs as she buries herself deeper into Katya’s arms, it’s impossible to tell where one of them ends and the other begins. Trixie tangles their legs together and closes her eyes, she pretends to be asleep twenty minutes later when Katya presses a kiss to the back of her neck and wishes her sweet dreams.

They both go to sleep with a smile on their faces.

 

* * *

 

 

Trixie’s therapist is a strange woman, she’s not conventional by any means, and it throws Trixie for a loop when she goes through her first couple of sessions. Her name is Ginger, and she’s a clearly takes no bullshit from anyone kind of person, she’s got a smoker’s cough and the shitty temperament to go with it. She’d get along great with Katya.

During their first session, not a lot happens; they sit on the couch together and do one of those colours by number drawings. Ginger tells her to ignore the numbers and use whatever colours she wants but she must colour from the left side and finish on the right, Trixie begins with pastel colours as her therapist begins to make small talk. She asks about her friends, her school life, her hobbies, and eventually her family.

Ginger doesn’t make her explain anything as to why she’s been signed up for therapy, she works with whatever Trixie is willing to provide, which she is extremely grateful for. Reliving childhood trauma isn’t exactly a good start to a meeting. However as the conversation goes on, Trixie begins to think more about why she’s there, what caused all of her problems, and why she’s in the position she’s in now. Ginger is setting down her pencils faster than Trixie assumed, had time really gone that fast?

“Well, looks like we’re out of time today, you’ve made amazing progress today, Miss Mattel”

“Just Trixie, please.” She protests. “Are we really done already? I feel like all we’ve done is colour.”

Ginger smiles, she has a weirdly maternal aspect to her, but she still looks like she’d tear your throat out without blinking. “We’ve actually done more than you think, I questioned you on your life to try and get a feel as to why you’re here without me asking you to spill your life story, that’s not how I do things here.”

Trixie raises her eyebrows, impressed. “So what did you learn?”

Ginger leans down slightly to pick up Trixie’s fish outline which was now coloured in, she then walks over to Trixie, stands next to her and shows her what she’d done.

“When we started the session, you started talking about your Mom and your best friends.” She explains, gesturing to the light colours of the fish. “However, when I got you talking about your senior year studies and eventually you alluded to a bad past with the male members of your family, you began to use darker colours.”

Trixie’s gaze moves over to the upper body and head of the fish, and what Ginger said was completely true, when she nearly mentioned her step-dad she began using darker blues and even greys and blacks at times. She whistles under her breath as she realises how much Ginger has been able to learn about her without even explicitly talking about it.

“That’s impressive,” Trixie notes, watching Ginger slide the work into a folder with Trixie’s name on it. “So now what?”

“My receptionist will contact you to arrange your next appointment, and I’d rather not tell you what we’ll be doing, it changes the patient’s behaviour when they know what I’m looking for. You’ve nothing to worry about, everything we do will be at your pace, this is about you getting healthy again, you don’t have anything to fear here.” Ginger says sincerely.

Trixie leaves not long later with a polite goodbye and as soon as she’s outside, she’s already searching for Katya’s phone number. She keeps the phone between her ear and shoulder when it starts ringing as she digs through her handbag for her car keys. After a couple of rings, Trixie thinks that her best friend isn’t going to pick up, but at the last minute the call goes through.

“Hello, you’ve reached America’s only high-class Russian whore, how may I service your needs today?”

Trixie can already feel her exhaustion slipping away at hearing Katya’s voice, she smiles as she finally finds her keys and unlocks her car. “I’m in need of a nap and a human pillow; can you provide that service for me?”

She hears Katya laugh from the other end of the line. “I can do all that and more, doll. Get your gigantic ass over here.”

Before she can reply, Sasha’s voice floats through the line. “Oh Christ, whenever you two start alleviating all this sexual tension, please don’t do it in this house.” Trixie claps her hand over her mouth as she laughs, the warm feeling in her cheeks spreading throughout her whole body. She cannot be thinking about sex with Katya right now, or ever, that’s super inappropriate. She hears Katya curse loudly and says something in Russian that sounds vaguely threatening, way to not make Trixie think about how attractive her voice is.

“My ass is not gigantic!” Trixie protests whilst still laughing.

“Trixie I love you, but your ass could suffocate me,” Katya replies as something thuds on her end, she probably threw something at Sasha.

Trixie screams. “Don’t project your fantasies on to me, you dirty whore!”

“Just hurry up and get over here, bring pizza, Sasha’s about to become my next blood sacrifice.” Katya declares.

“What do you mean _next_ blood sacrifice?” Trixie frowns as she slips the key into the ignition, thank god for the family mechanic for delivering Trixie’s baby back in one piece. It’s a Volkswagen Beetle, and it was going really cheap because no one wanted a bright pink car, except for Trixie. She still thinks that it was fate.

Katya laughs and hangs up; if it was literally anyone else then Trixie would be a little terrified. What a bitch. Trixie huffs and throws her bag on to the passenger seat, she turns the key and her little car rumbles to life. Thankfully she doesn’t need petrol again yet, she’s not sure she has enough cash to pay for both fuel and to fill Katya’s stomach. Before she puts the car into reverse, she sends a quick text to her Mom to say that she’ll be at Katya’s tonight and then sets off. She already knows that Katya would have rung their order through as soon as she put the phone down, they have set orders for every restaurant they order from, and they’re disgustingly domestic.

Trixie then uses one hand to control the car as she plugs in the aux cord to her phone with practiced ease, Michelle Branch begins to play softly through the speakers and for the first time in a while she’s honestly happy. She has her mom, her best friends, and she’s finally on her way to getting her shit together. What a concept.

It only takes around twenty minutes of driving to arrive at the pizza place, Trixie knows by now that it takes around thirty minutes for an order to be ready to collect, so she sits in the car for about ten minutes checking social media and replying to her mom’s text to have fun. When the time hits 5:20 Trixie exits her car, locks it, and walks into the restaurant.

There’s no one inside but the teenage boy behind the counter and Trixie’s order is already waiting on the counter, she walks up to the counter and smiles. “Hi, I’m here to collect an order, Trixie Mattel?”

The boy looks her up and down and then checks the computer next to him. “I’ve got an order for ‘Trixie’s huge ass’?” He then looks up again and grins wolfishly at her. “Makes sense now.”

Trixie pulls a face. “Sorry about that, my girlfriend thinks she’s really funny.” She then drops a twenty on to the counter and rushes out of the door with the bag. She’s going to kill Katya.

 

* * *

 

It takes twenty-five minutes to drive to the Velour household, when Trixie parks the car, Katya is waiting in the open doorway and Trixie wants to wipe that shit eating grin she’s wearing right off her face.

“You just got me hit on by a spotty teenage boy.”

Katya pretends to grimace but bursts out laughing a second later. “You’re welcome?”

“Fuck all the way off.” Trixie glares as she walks up to where her best friend is stood. “No pizza for you.”

Katya just keeps laughing. “Quoting Adore now?” When Trixie reaches her, Katya dramatically falls to her knees and clutches at the standing woman’s skirt. “Please Tracy, I am your humble servant, in return for your wonderful pie I’ll do anything.”

Trixie raises her eyebrows, just lately she can feel the two of them testing the boundaries of their friendship, the flirting was losing its joking nature, the lingering looks and touches were getting longer, and Trixie couldn’t get the other woman out of her damn mind. Moving back slightly, Trixie raises her leg slightly and uses the tip of her heeled shoe to gently push Katya back, the woman on her knees is an annoyingly attractive sight and Trixie can’t say that she doesn’t enjoy it. Normally she doesn’t have a problem with her partners taking control, but right now Trixie wants to be obeyed, and the thought sends a pleasant thrill through her body.

Katya’s eyes are wide, she clearly wasn’t expecting their back-and-forth dynamic to stretch this far. Good.

“Get inside and get me a soda and we’ll call it even.” Trixie pulls back and grins, she feels slightly elated at coming out of that little moment as the victor.

Katya shoves her playfully as she jumps back to her feet and beckons her inside the house, Trixie then remembers that Katya does not live alone and she’s thankful that Papa Velour is nowhere to be seen. At least if Sasha saw that, they could bring up the time that they saw her walk down the stairs with remnants of whipped cream still lingering on her neck. Trixie wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt and suggested that maybe they were just eating pie upstairs, but Katya took one look at her cousin and burst out laughing. “Someone’s been eating pie alright!” Then when Sasha had glared at her cousin, Trixie left the living room to go and find Sasha’s dad, surely he’d give her something to do rather than listen to his daughter’s lecture on appropriate behaviour when there are guests in the house. Trixie could already guess the cheeky retorts that would fly out of her friend’s mouth.

“I’m surprised you didn’t say anything disgusting to get a rise out of me,” Trixie says as she heads towards the kitchen.

She can hear Katya speeding up behind her and as she overtakes, she winks. “I was going to say I’d eat you out for the pizza, but I’d do that for you whenever you want without payment.”

Trixie’s steps falter and she‘s grateful that her makeup will most likely hide how violently she’s blushing. Katya takes the bag out of her hands and empties it out on to the kitchen table; there’s a meat feast for Katya, vegetable pizza for Trixie, a bottle of Pepsi, six cookies and two orders of fries. It’s a lot for just the two of them, but they’ll both eat cold pizza if there’s any spare. Trixie goes to take some fries from the open box, but Katya slaps her hand away and tells her to wait a second. She then pulls her phone out and takes a photo of their feast, looking over her shoulder, Trixie sees Katya type in the caption ‘she takes such good care of me’ and then posts it to her story.

“And now, we eat.” She raises her arms and calls out to the audience of one she currently has, Trixie can’t help but admire her enthusiasm for the smallest things, it’s cute.

Not long later, Katya’s phone starts buzzing, Trixie looks down at it and sees Bianca’s name. “Kat! Phone!”

Katya yells back from the kitchen. “If it’s immigration, ignore it!”

Taking that as permission, Trixie presses the green button and puts the phone on speaker. “Mattel’s Whores, if you want a Barbie, we can provide for a very reasonable fee. How can our girls service you today?”

The caller is silent for a second. “You’re answering the phone for her now? God Mattel, that’s pathetic.”

Trixie rolls her eyes. “Hello to you too, Bianca. What’s up?”

She can hear yelling in the background, and Bianca shushes whoever she’s with, three guesses who. “Adore just saw your girl’s snapchat, they’re mad that you ordered ‘a feast’ without them.”

Katya walks back into the room holding two glasses of soda. “Tell them they have my undying love and admiration and that I’m very sorry.”

“Fuck you, Zamo! Traitors!” Adore yells in the background.

“We love you, we’re sorry!” Trixie laughs into the receiver, Adore grumbles for a few moments before they hang up, and Trixie and Katya know they aren’t really angry with them.

Katya disappears for a few minutes before returning with a satisfied smile on her face, Trixie looks at her with a questioning expression, but Katya merely shakes her head and doesn’t explain. Trixie grabs the food from the kitchen and dumps it on Katya’s knee while she picks up the remote for the TV. Trixie then falls at her side on the sofa and wiggles to get into a comfortable position.

“Look at you; I knew you’d fall for me eventually.” Katya grins at her.

Trixie rolls her eyes and elbows her good-naturedly. “As if you knew the moment I fell for you.”

Her body tenses as Katya doesn’t reply for a second, then she laughs and Trixie is praying that they’ll move on. Picking up the remote, Katya scrolls through Netflix for a while before deciding upon some ridiculous documentary that Trixie knows she’ll fall asleep watching. She can’t help but grin slightly when she feels Katya shift closer to her on the sofa, every little interaction between them seems charged with some kind of energy ever since the night in Trixie’s garden. The rhythmic sound of Katya’s breathing next to her makes Trixie’s eyes droop, and her surroundings slowly begin to darken, the last thing she sees is Katya’s eyes focused on her.

 

* * *

 

Trixie slowly opens her eyes and hears Katya softly whispering her name, the nearby lamp light shines directly into her eyes and she squints to block out the intrusion. Katya chuckles quietly so not to disturb her, and then gently runs the back of her fingers down Trixie’s cheek to keep her awake.

“You won’t sleep tonight if you keep napping, Trix.” She murmurs.

Trixie groans. “For the love of all that is good and natural, please shut the fuck up.”

“Don’t make me snatch those fake eyelashes girl, you know I will!”

Trixie moves away quickly, well as quickly as she can in her half-asleep state. “Bitch don’t even come for my eyelashes, you know they’re not fake!”

Katya laughs. “It got you off my dead arm though, didn’t it?”

Trixie focuses and looks down, the bottom half of her body is still intertwined with Katya’s, and she somehow ended up curled up on the smaller woman during her nap.

“Oh my god I’m so sorry, you should have shoved me off or something,” Trixie complains; feeling mortified.

Katya shakes her head, and when she shifts Trixie notices that she’d been stroking her arm ever since she’d stopped touching her face. “We’ve been in more precarious positions than this, Tracy. It’s not a big deal.”

She laughs and nods. “You remember that time we crashed in Violet’s spare room after her party?” Katya looks puzzled for a second, so Trixie explains. “You thought you’d left a joint under the covers because we didn’t finish them, and when you went under to find it, Violet walked in with Pearl and Adore. Since I was trying to go back to sleep, my eyes were shut and I jumped a mile when they walked in, they instantly thought you were eating me out.”

“Oh shit yeah! I completely forgot about that, they all went mad that we didn’t tell them we were finally fucking.” Katya leans back; her eyes are bright with humour as she recalls the day. “Did I tell you what happened a couple of days later? In music class?”

Trixie shakes her head, cooing slightly when she sees dolphins swimming together on the screen.

“Visage cornered me in class and asked to speak to me, when you all went to lunch she asked me to ‘kindly stop Violet from talking about our newfound sex life’ when teachers could hear her since it was inappropriate for her to be aware of how we like to fuck.”

Trixie just stares with her jaw wide open, Katya looks at her and doubles over with the force of her laughter. Trixie shoves her and tries to force her cheeks to not burn. “You’re fucking with me, no way! I’m going to kill Violet.”

“I can’t believe I forgot to tell you though,” Katya mumbles distractedly as she watches the TV.

Trixie stares at her unabashedly for a few moments. “Interested in dolphins?”

She purses her lips for a moment as she considers her answer. “Not specifically, just nature and the question of existence in general.”

“It baffles me how people at school don’t see how intelligent you are.”

Katya raises an eyebrow. “Thanks, I think?”

Trixie scoffs. “Take the compliment, you bitch.”

“Ugh, I love it when you’re mean to me.” Katya squeals in her valley girl accent, making Trixie scream with laughter.

The atmosphere turns more serious as Katya begins to speak again. “What do you know about bottlenose dolphins?”

Trixie pretends to be thoughtful for a second, scrunching up her nose in the way she knows Katya thinks is adorable. “They live in the sea, and they get their name from their bottle-like noses?”

Katya stares at her with a deadpan expression. “A regular expert here then.”

Trixie nudges her and she continues. “Well this documentary is about homosexuality in the animal kingdom, dolphins are known for being one of the only species to have sex for pleasure and not just reproduction.”

“I love it when you talk science to me.” Trixie interrupts, playfully batting her eyelashes.

Katya pitifully fails at pushing down her laugh. “Shut up! Anyway, when there’s trouble between males, sometimes they’ll just fuck instead of fighting. How cool is that? Imagine if humans did that, wars would just become one massive orgy and no one would die.”

“I thought you had a serious point to make, but go off I guess.” Trixie shakes her head.

“There is nothing more serious than orgies, Tamara,” Katya states, her voice so devoid of humour that Trixie nearly believes her. “If you want a serious point though, penguins have been confirmed to be acting in a gay way since as early as 1917. The researchers were so disgusted that they buried the information from the public eye, and it only resurfaced in about 2012. In Israel, there were two female African penguins called Suki and Chupchikoni, and since penguins are some of the only animals that mate for life, they bonded. Originally though, the people who were caring for them assumed that Chupchikoni was male until her blood was tested. Way to erase the butch style, assholes.”

Trixie blinks. “Okay, that was deeper than I was expecting.”

“Don’t straight people suck?” Katya replies cheerfully.

Trixie grabs her can of soda and holds it aloft. “I’ll drink to that.” Katya then grabs hers and they clink their cans together.

They talk for a while longer about the documentary they’re watching until it ends, by this point they’ve both obliterated the pizzas and most of the fries. Katya throws the boxes next to her feet that are propped up on the coffee table; she sinks back into the sofa and cuddles into Trixie’s side.

Trixie’s phone chimes from the table, and Katya moves to grab it for her. Trixie takes it out of her hand, their fingers brushing together slightly. “It’s probably just my Mom making sure we haven’t gotten ourselves killed.”

Katya hauls herself to her feet and moves to take the boxes to the trash in the kitchen. “The night’s still young!”

Trixie shakes her head at her dumbass best friend, turning on her phone she sees that her Mom had texted her but the chiming had come from Instagram. Deciding that the text could wait, she swipes on the second notification and gets worried when she sees that Adore has tagged her in a post.

When the photo loads, she sees that it was obviously taken by Bianca; Adore is crouched behind a table grinning with their chin in their hands. There’s food identical to what Trixie had bought earlier for Katya spread out all over the table, and she knows what’s happened.

“Kat, did you buy Adore pizza?”

The woman walks back into the lounge and throws that bag of cookies on to Trixie’s lap, when they’re sat together on the sofa again, she replies. “I couldn’t help it! They always look so sad when they don’t get pizza; we have to take care of our child, Barbra!”

Trixie glowers at her before going back to the photo and double tapping it, she then looks down to see if there were any comments and there haven’t been. She doesn’t want to think about the bitter relief that takes over her mind.

_@adoredelano: my moms always take care of me_

Katya looks over her shoulder at the photo and cackles. “See, we can’t just abandon our child Trix, they need us.”

Trixie rolls her eyes. “I hate you both so much.”

The smaller woman looks up at her and the smile on her face shows she realises the bullshit that her best friend just tried to pull, Katya leans up and kisses Trixie’s cheek again before settling back down with her head lying on her shoulder. “I promise I won’t tell anyone how much you secretly worship us.”

 

* * *

 

When Trixie finds herself at Charles River, she knows she’s in trouble.

Everything had been going so well, she’d been to see Ginger twice more over the two weeks since her first session; she thought she was finally getting her shit together. Things with Katya had been progressing; Trixie even thought she might finally work up the nerve to make a move soon.

_All it took was one music test to make everything crash around me._ Trixie thinks as she stares out at the water, she’s leaning against the railing and internally glad that she’s turned her phone off. _A music test of all things. How fucking pathetic is that?_

She’d been sat in Miss Visage’s lesson, and things had been a little rocky that day, a niggling feeling of anxiety had been plaguing her all day and she hadn’t thought of the test she’d did a week prior. Katya had been watching her worriedly ever since lunch when she bit Violet’s head off for making a jokingly snide comment about her contour.

Miss Visage had frowned as she neared Trixie and Katya’s table, and when she placed Trixie’s paper on the desk she hovered for a second. _“I know you can do better than this, Trixie.”_

With shaking fingers, Trixie had picked up the test paper and looked at the bright red ‘F’ that had been stamped on the front sheet.

Trixie doesn’t really know how she got to where she is, she remembers asking to be excused and the next thing she knows she’s stood staring at Charles River. She sighs and leans further into the railing, looking into the water she wonders if she’d jump in if the barrier wasn’t there. Trixie isn’t suicidal by any stretch of the imagination and she knows that, doesn’t mean the idea of not existing anymore isn’t appealing though.

During her last session, Ginger had given her a couple of tricks to try and force her mind under her control, even though she’s not having a panic attack, something really does not feel right. It feels as if she’s a few inches behind her body, like she’s in control of her mind, but not of her body. Trixie closes her eyes and counts out what she can sense.

  * _I can smell my perfume._
  * _I can hear the birds calling as they fly by._
  * _I can feel the cold bar of the barrier in my hands._
  * _I can taste the salt in the water._
  * _I can see the world around me._



She opens her eyes and takes in the colours of the scenery around her, she has control of her senses, and the rest will soon follow. Trixie can’t help but think of Katya when she looks at the water, the combination of blues where the sunlight hits the river reminds her of days in the Velour basement while Katya painted. They’d always have some kind of music on, and Trixie would always try and switch the music to something country while Katya was too in the zone to notice.

She thinks back to the one time that Katya caught her doing it mid-change and flicked blue paint at her, she’d grabbed a brush and traced pink paint down Katya’s face like tear streaks. The moment had been more intimate than intended; Katya had merely smiled disarmingly and then smacked Trixie on the ass with a handful of blue paint. She squealed when she realised the handprint that was on her sweats, but then she remembered that they were a pair that Katya kept in her house specifically for her.

Coming back to the present, the last thing she wants is to go home, but she also does not want to be alone right now. She takes her bag off her shoulder and rummages around inside until she finds her iPhone; the pink case usually makes her smile, but not today.

She powers it up and wants to throw up when the flurry of messages nearly blows up her phone. She doesn’t look at all of them, over the last few days Violet, Fame, Pearl and even Cracker and Monet had been constantly telling her to sort her shit out with Katya. She knows that it needs to be addressed, but the thought of everyone pressuring her to do something about it when she wasn’t ready was making her nauseous.

The majority of messages and missed calls had been from Adore, Katya and Bianca, if the old bag was trying to talk to her then Adore must have been worried.

_New messages from Kat:_  
Are you okay in the bathroom? (13:04)  
you’ve been gone a while girl, don’t tell me you’re using dirty heroin needles now (13:20)  
Trixie where are you? (13:24)  
Visage looks mad, I’ve asked around and no one knows where you’ve gone (13:36)  
have you left school? (13:42)  
Tracy (13:48)  
Tobey (13:48)  
Trixie for fucks sake where are you, we’re getting worried (13:55)  
I just stopped Visage from calling Val, please tell us you’re safe (14:10)

_New messages from Adore:_  
Zamo’s freaking out where the fuck are you? (13:45)  
If you’re dead I’ll bring you back and kill you myself (13:50)  
Don’t make me get Bianca, I’m a big baby bitch and she’ll yell at you (13:55)  
I’m kidding don’t be mad (13:56)  
I know you prefer to be left alone when you’re upset or whatever, but I’m getting scared. Katya’s trying to blow it off but she’s picking at her nails again. I know she’s scared too. (14:07)  
Please call us Trixie, we drove past your house and your car isn’t there, we know you’re not at home (14:20)

Bianca’s messages were along the same line but more threatening, Trixie claps her hand to her mouth and fights down the feeling of self-hatred and shame that tear through her heart. She hates that she’s scared her friends, she checks the time and realises that it’s nearly 4 PM, the last messages from her friends were similar but the most recent from Adore pulls at her heartstrings.

_Val just called us, she said to let you know that she’ll be late home tonight, we decided to not tell her yet but if you’re still dark later we’re telling her. Trixie, you’ve been gone for hours, fucking call us. (15:38)_

Trixie knows she’s in for it, but putting it off would be more damaging. She taps on the phone icon on the screen and calls Adore’s phone. It picks up nearly instantly and the first thing Trixie hears is a sigh of relief, the sound of her friends’ voices instantly makes her feel a little more grounded, and she sags a little as the tension leaves her shoulders.

“I swear to god Mattel, you’ll die by my hands only after today.”

Trixie wasn’t expecting Bianca to be the person on the other end of the line, and she can’t help it, she laughs.

“Oh, it’s funny? Wait until I’ve locked you in a room with an angry Bebe that bitch is tiny but she’ll tear your throat out.“ Bianca scathes.

The lack of tentative behaviour is comforting, she can hear Adore yelling at Bianca to be nice and find out where the hell Trixie is. If there’s one thing Bianca is good at though, it’s bringing people down enough to get them to focus, and she knows it.

“Are you gonna tell us where you are or do I have to sit in this death trap while Adore drives all around Boston?” Bianca probes.

Trixie lets out a watery chuckle. “I’m at Charles River.”

“How the fuck did you get there?” Adore asks, the voice is far away enough for Trixie to know that Bianca is in the back seat while they drive.

“I don’t know, I remember leaving class and then the next thing I knew I was registering the smell of the River like I’d just woken up.” She explains, and frowns at Bianca’s whisper of ‘fuck’.

“You dissociated and drove 13 miles? Fuck man, you’re lucky you’re not dead!” Adore yells, Bianca yells at them to focus on the road and someone else shushes them both.

“Adore? Is Katya with you?” Trixie asks, pinching the skin of her left thigh slightly.

There was no reply for a couple of seconds, and then some quiet whispering, as if Trixie couldn’t hear it. “Yeah, she’s here.”

“Katya, are you okay?” Trixie asks.

“Guess it’s hard to get an answer to that question isn’t it.” Katya bites. There’s the sound of a muffled slap and she cries out. “Shit I’m sorry Trixie, I didn’t mean that. I’m just glad you’re okay.”

Trixie is still slightly taken aback; she knows that she’s fucked her friends around since all this shit started. Katya had never once bitten back at her though, and Trixie begins to realise how much of a bitch she’s been. She doesn’t want to think about the hell that she must have put them through today. “Guys I’m so fucking sorry, you don’t need to come up here I’m just gonna drive home-“

She gets interrupted by a stream of protests; Bianca’s being the clearest since she’s holding the phone. “You keep your native ass in that damn spot until we get there, you aren’t safe to drive Trixie don’t be a dumbass.”

“I got here fine didn’t I?”

Someone else takes the phone and Katya begins to talk. “Beatrice if you get in that car I swear I’ll- I don’t know what I’ll do but know it’ll be embarrassing and probably painful.”

Adore yells from the driver’s seat. “Oh, bitch she full named you! You’re in trouble” They speak like an annoying child on the playground, and if Trixie wasn’t so mentally and physically exhausted, she’d punch them.

“Don’t full name me…” Trixie grumbles.

“Well stay there; we’re about twenty minutes away, or fifteen with Adore’s perception of speeding laws,” Bianca calls out.

“Okay, I’ll sit tight,” Trixie replies, Bianca’s voice gets softer as she reminds her to be safe and not do anything stupid before putting the phone down.

Dropping the phone back into her bag, Trixie examines her surroundings. There’s a family buying ice cream for their son quite a way down from her, a teenager is lying on the grass with her headphones on and seemingly taking a nap, and there are also two people holding hands as they walk down the riverside. Turning back to the water, Trixie wonders if it’s obvious she was thinking about the benefits of just falling into the river. She wonders how many people she’s walked past who have been considering committing suicide, or many people she’s walked past that ended up doing it.

She never thought that she’d be one of those people that thought about trying it, before she understood the complexity and severities of mental health issues; she used to think it was a weak option. Now she looks at the people around her and understands why people feel the pull, it leaves a calm feeling lingering in her mind and it would be so easy.

Trixie isn’t going to seriously consider it though, she knows what it would do to her Mom and her friends, and it would destroy them. The thought of leaving them makes her want to cry, but she’s too numb and she knows it should terrify her, but she doesn’t know how to be scared. The comfort that Bianca, Adore and Katya had given her had been sapped from her system by the defection of her own mentality. How poetic.

She feels rather than sees when they arrive, the rumbling of Adore’s damaged engine can be heard across the state, Trixie turns around to see Adore falling out of their car and the sight puts a small smile on her face. Bianca gets out and says something that makes them laugh, and Katya follows behind without taking her eyes off Trixie. The three begin to walk down the path to where she’s stood, and Trixie shamefully looks away, feeling guilty.

She closes her eyes and keeps her head down, she hears the quick pattering of footsteps and Trixie is nearly taken off her feet as she’s barrelled into by someone. Looking down she sees Katya’s blonde hair and her arms are wrapped around Trixie’s waist tight enough to make them both uncomfortable.

“Don’t scare me like that again; I thought Jinkx had sacrificed you.” Katya murmurs, her voice muffled by Trixie’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry I didn’t mean to,” Trixie replies, wrapping her arms around Katya and clinging to her just as tightly.

They stand in a similar position until Bianca clears her throat to show they’re also there, Trixie pulls back enough to look at the two new arrivals and Adore needles their way into the hug, Katya looks over at Bianca. “Get in this love fest, Bonnie!”

Bianca stares at the three of them. “Get this gay shit away from me.”

Adore looks over and grins wickedly. “You mean this gay shit?” They then spring at Bianca and she catches them on instinct, Adore peppers their face with kisses and Bianca just stands and takes it. It’s a disgustingly cute sight, even though Bianca looks like she hates her partner with every fiber of her being, it’s easy to see the love between them.

Katya is leaning on Trixie with her arm on the taller woman’s shoulder; they look at each other and grin at their friends’ antics. “Feeling any more stable?”

Trixie grimaces. “More stable, but not any better.”

“Well at least you’re safe, that’s the important thing,” Katya says softly, nudging Trixie with her nose.

“And we’re the gays?” Adore says sarcastically.

“Yeah, you are.” Katya counters, showing all of her teeth with that dumb grin that Trixie loves.

“Are we going to talk about any of this, or just leave it as the elephant in the proverbial room?” Bianca asks.

Trixie goes back to looking out at the water, like she can escape through it; Katya feels her tense and pulls her closer. Adore side-eyes them and clears their throat. “Bea, feel like finding somewhere to get food before we drive home?”

“Look at you using your intuition; we’ll make an adult out of you yet.”

Adore purses their lips and elbows them, they turn around and make a half-hearted excuse about food and take off back up the path and towards the nearest street. Katya shakes her head and sighs dramatically, Trixie looks down at her questioningly and she laughs. “They’re not subtle are they?”

Trixie laughs along with her. “I don’t think it was meant to be subtle, Kat.”

The laughter between them dies down pretty quickly as the reality sets in, Trixie knows that they need to talk, but it doesn’t mean that she wants to have the conversation. Katya moves away from her slightly and they both move to lean against the railing, mirroring the other’s position. The silence between them stretches and Trixie refuses to be the one to speak first.

“What happened today, Trixie?” Katya looks over at her, still staring when Trixie refuses to meet her gaze.

“I got a bad grade in music, and I didn’t take it well.” Trixie deadpans.

“Why?” The woman adjacent to her asks, staying as clinical as possible.

“I don’t know.”

Katya keeps staring. “That’s not an answer-“

“I don’t know!” Trixie repeats, frustration showing through her tone. “I’ve been on edge for fucking days, I thought I had a handle on things but all it took was a bad grade and then I go off the handle. I’m fucking pathetic.”

Katya turns her whole body to face her but says nothing, waiting for Trixie to continue. “I know I’ve been a bitch, I treat you guys like shit because I can only think of myself whenever it starts getting to me and I hate it.”

“It’s not a bad thing that you prioritise yourself when anything happens Trixie, not putting yourself first is what got you into breakdown mode in the first place. Shutting yourself in and hoping it will go away is going to make things worse, take it from a bitch that’s lived through it.” Katya implores, placing a hand on top of Trixie’s.

Nothing else is said for a few minutes while Trixie gathers her thoughts, everything is crashing around inside her head and she needs it all to stop. Katya remains diligently by her side and doesn’t say a word, just gently strokes along Trixie’s back with her fingertips to offer some semblance of comfort.

“Do you still think about killing yourself?” Trixie asks, refusing to move her gaze from the river.

It takes a minute or so but Katya replies. “Yes, I do.”

The outright ownership of the fact makes her stomach turn. “How does it make it you feel?”

“Numb, terrified, relieved, angry.”

Trixie would be blinking back tears if her tear ducts worked. “That doesn’t give me a lot to go on, Kat.”

Katya breathes out a laugh. “If you’re looking for an answer, you need to ask me a question, Mama. I’m okay to go.”

Trixie’s eyes slightly. “If that’s a Contact reference I’m going to kill you.”

Silence is her only answer for a few seconds before they both start chuckling quietly, the humour covering the rawness of the problem. Trixie can feel Katya staring at her. “Trix, if there’s something you need help with-“

“There isn’t.” Trixie adamantly interrupts. “I’m just trying to understand your past a little better.” She knows that Katya has worked out what she’s refusing to admit by her eyes widening and her breathing becoming a little more labored. Thankfully though, Katya says nothing and Trixie’s stomach unclenches.

Thin fingers slowly intertwine with hers. “I don’t know what you want me to tell you. Everyone has a different experience with mental health, but don’t force it down thinking you can you just ignore it. This is a bit of a shitty comparison, but it’s a lot like falling in love. You can’t control it without time and practice and you sure as hell can’t ignore it.”

If this were a different conversation, a different time, Trixie would have turned her head and told Katya how serious she is every time she tells her she’s beautiful. How when she talks about politics or philosophy in class it makes Trixie’s stomach turn into a bundle of nerves, how beautiful she looks when she cries. In another time, maybe she would have the confidence to place her fingers under Katya’s chin and pull her face towards her so she could gently press their lips together in a tender kiss.

“I know I should be prioritising it, my health should come before anything, but it’s exhausting thinking about it all the time. I don’t want to be that girl that’s imprisoned by it.” Trixie puts her chin in her hands as she stares out at the water; she shifts her elbows against the railing to get more comfortable and sighs.

Katya copies her movements and their sides connect. “Is there something else you want to talk about?”

She steels her resolve and looks at her best friend; they stare at each other for a couple of minutes as Trixie takes in every single detail of Katya’s face. By the thoughtful expression looking back at her, Katya is doing exactly the same. Trixie stands up and waits for her to mirror the position she’s stood in, when she does Trixie raises her hands and gently touches Katya’s face.

“I get that you’re having a moment, but I’m a little confused,” Katya says, minimising the movement of her lips so not to disturb the inquisitive touches on her face.

Trixie quietly laughs, slowing her movements to the point that her fingers are resting on Katya’s jaw. “Tell me I’m not imagining this.”

A look of clarity passes over Katya’s features and her eyes soften as she realises what Trixie is talking about. “You’re not imagining it.”

A smile breaks free of the taller woman’s face. “Wait seriously?”

Katya laughs. “Yeah seriously.”

By the look on her face, it’s obvious that Trixie looks as shocked as she feels. “How long?”

“You’ve had me since that time you cursed out Betty for me.” Katya smiles bashfully.

Trixie’s jaw drops. “Kat that was about a month after you moved to our school?”

She nods. “Trust me; I know how long it’s been.”

A sound of disbelief falls out of Trixie’s mouth before she can even register it, she was expecting Katya to politely let her know that everything was just in her head, but it’s not. She moves closer to the other woman and presses their foreheads together, and she lets out a shaky breath.

“Fuck me, I have the worst timing…” She breathes.

Katya’s eyebrows furrow. “Why?” She whispers just as quietly.

“It’s not fair for us to do this now,” Trixie replies.

“Don’t say that, of course we can.” Katya protests vehemently.

“I’m not in a good place right now Katya and we both know that,” Trixie affirms. “I want to give you absolutely everything but we need to focus on ourselves, you need to decide on a college without me influencing your decision. I need to work through my shit without using you or Adore or anyone as a crutch, I realised earlier how I treat you guys when I can’t control what’s going on. If we start dating and I freak out, I’d never forgive myself if I pushed you away because of my shit.”

Katya looks as if she wants to argue, but she just sighs and nods reluctantly. “I thought I should tell you I think I’m going back to my therapist too; I understand why you want to hold off on this I promise. This isn’t some bullshit romantic comedy where the couple starts dating and all of a sudden depression and anxiety don’t exist anymore.”

“Exactly,” Trixie agrees, “I swear whenever I eventually ask you out, I’m taking you on the best first date ever.”

Katya pulls back. “Hold up bitch, who said you would plan the first date? You’re not the top in this.”

Trixie bursts out laughing. “Maybe not totally a top, but you sure as hell aren’t one when it comes to me.”

“I object to that claim, I am quite obviously an independent dyke who bottoms for no woman.” Katya turns her face to the side, failing to stop Trixie from seeing her smile.

Trixie leans in close and whispers in her ear. “Keep telling yourself that, Пчелка.”

Katya’s eyes widen for a second before she recovers herself. “First of all, how did I not know you speak Russian? Second, ‘little bee’ is not the nickname I was hoping you’d give me.”

Trixie laughs. “I don’t speak Russian, I just asked Sasha to teach me a couple of words and phrases that might end up being useful with no questions asked. You’re always hyperactive and buzzing around, I thought it fits.”

Katya purses her lips and glowers playfully. “What else do you know how to say?”

Trixie bites her lip and moves away from her embrace. “Give it time and maybe you’ll find out.”

She’ll deny it to her dying day, but Katya fucking _blushes_ and Trixie almost squeals. “I’ll find out eventually, Куколка.”

Trixie tries desperately to recall the translation. “Baby doll?” Katya nods. “I’ll take it.”

The other woman smirks. “Yeah, you will!”

Trixie screams. “Oh my god, shut up.”

 

* * *

 

Even though the flirting has increased tenfold Trixie knows it’s not their time, there’s so much going on at the minute and there’s so much that could go wrong, it wouldn’t be fair to try anything now. Neither of them knows how far they’ll be away from each other when they go to college, and Trixie wants to be confident in her mind when she finally makes her move. She now knows that there’s something between them, and she can wait for it.

Trixie smiles in response to watching Katya’s calm aura whenever she thinks; a warm feeling fills her at the sight in front of her. She moves her hand over and takes Katya’s cold hand into her own. Trixie squeezes her hand and hopes that she understands the message _: I’m here, I love you, you’re everything to me._

Katya squeezes back even tighter. “Can you do me a favour though, Trix?”

Trixie smiles. “Anything.”

“Tell Raja you won’t be interested in sleeping with her ever again.”

Katya cackles when Trixie shoves her, and when Adore starts yelling about wanting to leave from where the car is parked, Katya intertwines her fingers with Trixie’s. They both smile at each other and begin to walk back to their friends, even though barely anything had happened it felt like the world had been pulled from under their feet.

Trixie pulls Katya closer to her side as they walk, reassured in the knowledge that whatecer was between them would still be there when Trixie gets better and nothing needed to be forced for now.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, that was an experience, huh?
> 
> It didn't feel right giving them an immediate happy ending because they're all a bit messy and problematic enough to write a whole series on them fucking up. So I thought I'd give them a hopeful ending?
> 
> Also, the thing about dolphins and penguins was a genuine conversation I had with my friend while I was stoned, I had to make use of it.
> 
> Hit me up on Tumblr if you want to talk @fudgesiclefantasy, I'm a nice person with a lot to offer.


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